A favorite pastime of Internet users is to share their location: services like Google Latitude can inform friends
when you are nearby; another, Foursquare, has turn ed reporting these updates into a game.

…But as a German Green party politician, Malte Spitz, recently learned, we are already continually being tracked whether we volunteer to be or not. Cellphone companies do not typically divulge how much information they collect, so Mr. Spitz went to court to find out exactly what his cellphone company, Deutsche Telekom, knew about his
whereabouts.

The results were astounding. In a six-month period — from Aug 31, 2009, to Feb. 28, 2010, Deutsche Telekom had recorded and saved his longitude and latitude coordinates more than 35,000 times. It traced him from a train on the way to Erlangen at the start through to that last night, when he was home in Berlin.

Read more here.

Next read Purushottam by Firoz Bakht Ahmed:

On behalf of all Muslims catering to the voice of reason and sanity in India and globally, I declare that the ASI affidavit (now withdrawn) was vitriolic, scathing, unfortunate and absolutely blasphemic — not only for the Hindus but for all those who cherish our pluralistic cultural heritage. By the way how can a government decide the veracity of a
figure like Ram?

Therefore, it goes without saying that Ram and the Ramayan are central to both India’s social history and to our civilizational identity no matter to what religion we belong to. Denying Ram his place would mean falsifying with impunity, India’s civilizational character.

Hai  Ram  ke  wajood  pe  Hindostan  ko  naaz, Ahl-e-nazar samajhtey hain usko Imam-e-Hind.

Iqbal, the poet of the East has written a wonderful and moving poem on the authenticity of the existence of Ram.

Read the full article here.

Next read, History and faith are beyond law by Kanchan Gupta:

James Tod joined the Bengal Army as a cadet in 1799, presumably looking for a life of adventure in the heat and dust of India. He swiftly rose through the ranks and, as a Lieutenant-Colonel, provided valuable service to the East India Company. His uncanny ability to gather information helped the early colonisers smash the Maratha Confederacy.

Later, his assistance was sought during the Rajputana campaign. Colonel Tod, as he was known, was a natural scholar with an eye for detail and a curious mind. He was fascinated by the history of Rajputana and its antiquities as much as by its palace intrigues and the shifting loyalties of its rulers and their factotums. That fascination led to his penning two books that are still considered mandatory reading for anybody interested in the history of the Rajputs…

Thousands of people, Indians and foreigners, Muslims and non-Muslims, visit Ajmer every day to offer a chaadar at Dargah Sharif of Hazrat Khwaja Moinuddin Chisti, a shrine where all are welcome and every prayer is answered, or so the pious choose to believe. Many stay on to visit the other antiquities of Ajmer, among them a magnificent mosque complex which bears little or no resemblance to its name: Adhai Din Ka Jhonpra.

People gawk at the columns and the façade intricately carved with inscriptions from the Quran in Arabic. They pose for photographs or capture the mosque’s ‘beauty’ on video cameras and carry back memories of Islam’s munificence towards its followers. Don’t forget to visit Adhai Din Ka Jhonpra, they will later tell friends and relatives visiting Ajmer.

…let us return to Adhai Din Ka Jhonpra in Ajmer. Few who have seen and admired this mosque complex would be aware of Colonel Tod’s description of it in the first volume of Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan: “The entire façade of this noble entrance . is covered with Arabic inscriptions . but in a small frieze over the apex of the arch is contained an inscription in Sanskrit.” And that oddity tells the real story of Adhai Din Ka Jhonpra.

Read the real story here.

And finally, Manmohanomics by Vivek Dehejia:

The truth is, the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty have never really believed in liberal economic policy. Period. That is why no major reform has ever occurred under their watch. The original reforms in 1991 were launched, don’t forget, when the Gandhis were absent, and the next phase of reforms took place under non-Congress-led governments, most notably the BJP-led NDA.

The reasons for this could be manifold. Do they really believe in the socialism that their founder, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, espoused and then foisted on us after Independence? Possibly. Perhaps more likely, they see populism and patronage as political winners. That was certainly how the wily Mrs. Indira Gandhi operated, and her daughter-in-law seems to have taken a leaf from the same playbook.

Read it in full here. Enjoy the weekend. Stay safe and stay healthy… Past weekend readings are here.

Japan earthquake: Emperor Akihito’s exceptional speech

Minutes before Emperor Akihito made his first-ever television address to his people, the Japanese public broadcaster NHK instructed its editors to cut into the speech if important news on the unfolding nuclear crisis broke

Japan earthquake: Emperor Akihito’s exceptional speechMinutes before Emperor Akihito made his first-ever television address to his people, the Japanese public broadcaster NHK instructed its editors to cut into the speech if important news on the unfolding nuclear crisis broke

K Klutch Klan, via centerofright

IN THE summer of 1991, in a crowded political rally in Patna, thousands stirred impatiently as a portly Muthuvel Karunanidhi, in dark glasses, white shirt and dhoti, walked up to the podium. Expecting the chief minister of Tamil Nadu and leader of the Dravidian movement to speak in nothing but chaste Tamil, people settled down to catch a few winks before the good Hindi stuff would begin. Unfazed, Karunanidhi adjusted the mike down to his height, cleared his throat and said in perfect English: “Before I proceed with my speech I would like to introduce myself,” he said. “My name is Karunanidhi. I am anti-national… I am a dangerous person to this country.”

Black money issue: Hasan Ali Khan not cooperating with ED

Even as the Enforcement Directorate (ED) secured the custody of Pune-based stud farm owner Hasan Ali Khan to interrogate him in a money laundering case following the Supreme Court’s intervention, sources told Headlines Today on Saturday that he was not cooperating with the agency and was tight-lipped on accusations levelled against him.

Ali, alleged to be the country’s biggest tax evader, refused to answer specific queries by the ED on his cross-border transactions. He has been telling the sleuths that he has no bank accounts abroad and that he has not stashed black money in foreign accounts. Sources said Ali has not yet revealed anything concrete which can help ED in its probe to nail him.

More on Hasan Ali: here and here

and finally, Atanu Dey

I feel outrage, why don’t you? I feel outraged that India is a desperately poor country. Outrage that our children are malnourished, and our people abjectly poor. Outrage that people are committing suicide by the hundreds of thousands. (Farmers are people too. If there had been alternatives to doing subsistence farming, they would not have had to kill themselves.)

Every aspect of the dire straits that India is absolutely due to government policy. Every one of them — farmers killing themselves, children starving, school and colleges failing, massive public corruption, loss-making public enterprises, communal conflict, terrorist attacks, weak borders, military insecurity, you name it. Just ask and I will show step by step why government policy is at the root of India’s troubles.

…

What have we come to? We have been diminished as a people. Our society is so impoverished that the old and infirm have to beg for a living. As a society, we are not just poor; we are impoverished — meaning reduced to poverty, deprived of richness, vitality and strength.

How did we get here? We are not evil people; we are not stupid people; periodic natural calamities have not reduced our work to rubble; foreign forces have not robbed us of our wealth; divine curse has not condemned us to hell. So why then all the misery?

I have sought an answer for many years. And here’s my answer. India’s government is the greatest evil force that is destroying India. Manmohan Singh epitomizes that evil since he heads that government. So I believe that unless we wake up and destroy those who seek our destruction, we would be responsible for our demise.

Have a relaxing weekend. Stay safe. Past weekend readings are here.

First, excerpts from A ‘moth-eaten’ India? by Chandan Mitra (Feb ’10; emphasis added):

A small but influential section of public opinion in India has been pleading for “flexibility” in the Government’s approach to the Kashmir issue. Some important opinion makers have, in fact, gone on record to suggest that India will gain, not lose, stature if it gives up the Kashmir Valley in order to buy peace with Pakistan…After losing nearly 1,00,000 lives in 22 years of insurgency, isn’t it high time that Delhi considered this “out-of-the-box” solution? And if that is not quite practical yet, what about joint sovereignty? Why can’t undivided J&K have a united quasi-Parliament thereby abolishing borders and giving equal say to India, Pakistan and the “people” of the State over its destiny?

…There may not be too many takers for such abject capitulation, but the fact that these views are increasingly aired in public appears to have put the Government on the defensive.

…This section of appeasement peddlers are, therefore, certain to overlook the menacing threat conveyed earlier this month by Jamaat-ud-Dawa (euphemism for Laskhar-e-Tayyeba) deputy chief Abdur Rahman Makki. Speaking at a Kashmir Day rally in Islamabad on February 5, the fire-spewing Makki not only let slip that Pune was on their radar, but also declared that jihad was also to be waged against the alleged denial of river water to Pakistan. This is a very significant addition to Pakistan’s agenda, doubly important because it is a “secular” inter-governmental matter rather than emotional or Islamist.

…This brings us to the fundamental question: Will Pakistan’s blood-feud with India ever end? Will Islamabad be satisfied even if, for argument’s sake, Delhi agrees to part with the Kashmir Valley? All these years, Pakistani leaders across political hues kept harping primarily on Kashmir, former President Musharraf candidly declaring it to be the core issue. After resisting this classification for some years, India succumbed, saying it was ready to discuss Kashmir if Pakistan addressed our concern over cross-border terror. At Sharm-al-Sheikh, India bent down further agreeing, first, to delink terror from talks acknowledging Pakistan too was a victim and, second, to bring Balochistan on the table. Events of the last few months culminating in Delhi’s latest genuflection clearly establish that the Sharm-al-Sheikh joint declaration was not a case of “bad drafting” as the Government wanted us to believe. It was, in fact, a formal statement of India’s revised position which also amounted to quietly admitting Pakistan’s charge that we have fomented disaffection in Balochistan.

A pattern is now rapidly falling into place. First Pakistan forced us to agree, howsoever reluctantly, that Kashmir was indeed the “core issue”. Second, it got us embroiled in the problem of Balochistan whose mere mention in an official document was sufficient for Islamabad to claim victory.

And finally, by getting jihadis to talk about the water dispute, Pakistan has ensured that the arena of its conflict with India continues to widen. As it gets its way on one, it pushes forward a second and then a third. Shrewdly assessing the Obama Administration’s burning desire to exit Afghanistan soon, Pakistan is cunningly seeking to get more and more pressure mounted by Washington on Delhi.

…The opening of the water front by jihadi groups is aimed solely at aggravating alleged Pakistani angst against India, thereby legitimising their ongoing campaign of terror. Makki’s bloodthirsty diatribe, saying that “denial” of water justifies targeting cities like Delhi, Kanpur and Pune, that is, places way beyond Jammu and Kashmir, gives the game away.

Who knows what more will be added to the jihadi wish-list in the years to come? Hyderabad, Junagadh, Assam, Kolkata? Jinnah complained in 1947 that he had been tricked into accepting a “moth-eaten Pakistan”. The jihadis are carrying forward the promised 1,000-year war to reduce India to a moth-eaten entity, within and without.

Image courtesy: Govt of Jammu & Kashmir’s official website

Next read Sh Jagmohan (former Governor, J&K)’s views on Constitutional Illiteracy on Jammu & Kashmir (Jan ’10; emphasis added):

Those who demand pre-1952/53 status or advocate maximum autonomy for Jammu and Kashmir take care not to address certain concrete questions. They remain conveniently vague and show little respect for the practical implications of their stand.

For instance, they suppress the fact that in the absence of full financial integration with the Union, Jammu and Kashmir would have no resources at all for development. It is the Union finances that provide the entire funds for the state’s five-year plans and also for a substantial part of the non-plan expenditure. The extent of finances available to it from the Union can be seen from the fact that while Bihar gets per capita assistance of Rs 876, Jammu and Kashmir gets Rs.9,754 — about 11 times more than one of the poorest states of India. Further, in the case of Jammu and Kashmir, 90 per cent of this assistance is in the shape of grants and 10 per cent as loans while for most other states it is 30 per cent grants and 70 per cent loans…What will happen if this link is ended? Who will fill in the gap?

…If funds continue to flow to Kashmir from the Union, as at present, and it is allowed, as is being advocated in certain quarters, to have an exclusive say on subjects other than defence, external affairs and communications, it could enact Islamic civil and criminal laws and even set up Shariat courts, on the same lines as has been done in Pakistan, and make it virtually a theocratic entity. Would not such a scenario do violence to the very preamble of our Constitution and also amount to secularism financing a theocracy propelled by forces of bigotry and fundamentalism?

The problem of Jammu and Kashmir has not been insufficiency but surfeit of powers.

…The crucial questions that need to be asked to the singers of the autonomy ode are…In what way is any welfare work or work of development held up for want of powers? Is there is any law or executive order or judicial pronouncement that has undermined the personality or identity of Kashmir or altered its culture or spiritual landscape?

It needs to be underlined that Jammu and Kashmir is the only state of the Indian Union, which has its own Constitution…The special position of the state also extends to many other spheres. While the citizens of Jammu and Kashmir are citizens of India and have six members of parliament as their representatives, the citizens of India are not ipso facto citizens of Jammu and Kashmir. They cannot hold property in the state. They have no right to vote in elections to the Assembly or the municipalities or the panchayats. A woman citizen of Jammu and Kashmir loses her property and other rights if she marries a non-state subject. Further, no declaration of financial emergency can be made in regard to Jammu and Kashmir. Nor can the president of India issue directions to the Jammu and Kashmir state government in exercise of the executive power of the Union — a power that he enjoys with regard to all other states.

Next, Vinod Sharma on why the enemy is in our midst, written in Jul ’10 (emphasis added):

…Unfortunately for India, (Barkha) Dutt is not alone in this defaming, this deforming, this defeating of India. The so-called liberal media and the academia are full of such people…They have been working over time even after 26/11 to convince India that Pakistan actually needs to be strengthened and that India must make fatal concessions to that country to buy peace. Friendship is what these people talk of all the time, even though Pakistan shows no sign or interest whatsoever in letting up on its proxy war. That,

some believe, is primarily because they are convinced that any tough talk, forget action, against a rogue state that needs to be whipped blue, will cost votes of Indian Muslims and thereby the throne of Delhi.

The violence which erupted in the Valley during the last month took everybody by surprise, when it should never have. This is not the first time that India has been so surprised. Worryingly, it will keep getting caught unprepared because those who should keep their senses alert when dealing with Pakistan readily trust –at least pretend to — the smiles and the blatantly fraudulent explanations that they are given, whether by leading Pakistani journalists..or the establishment, whose voice the former articulate with some sophistication.

More damaging than the stones that youth of a few districts of Kashmir Valley have been throwing at India are the ones that some Indian have thrown at their own country.

…The tragedy of India is that such fellows who have little qualms about betraying their own people made refugees by violent religious extremism — what to talk of India — are made members of the National Security Advisory Board and other national institutions. Should that surprise us any more? Can, in Pakistan, people with these kind of views even dream of finding such favour of the ruling establishment?

Let us not be under any illusion that the problem in Kashmir will go away if Manmohan Singh implements the Youth Empowerment Scheme that Matto is selling, even though he knows better, or if India signs the sell-out deal with Pakistan that Musharraf had proposed. Autonomy and azaadi are red herrings that will yield no return whatsoever; they have not in 63 years, will not in a hundred. The proposed deal with Pakistan will only result in handing over the Valley on a platter to it, with the rest of the state also being lost. As I and many others have been saying, there will be no peace in Kashmir till Pakistan swallows it. And — this is vital — if it does, there will be no peace in the rest of India.

…As long as Pakistan exists, blood will flow. Pakistan is not in a hurry. To its jihadi mindset, the dead give life; the more the better. There is no room for sentiment. To the emotional and soft Indian, tears are enough to wipe away the sight of what lies behind them. Pakistanis and Kashmiris know it all too well….Kashmiris only have to pelt a few stones at India’s hapless defenders. Mindless, even dishonest Indians are waiting to pick and throw them and some of their own too, at their own country, and earn fulsome praise of its only enemy.

India is fighting the Fourth Battle of Panipat in Kashmir. The next stop is Delhi. So those who are asking India to capitulate there are effectively asking India to surrender as a nation.

…India is being stoned by Indians. The enemy is in our midst. We cannot defeat Pakistan till we defeat him. The sooner we do it, the better.

And finally, a Jan ’10 report on the travails of Kashmiri Muslims outside Kashmir by Rustam (emphasis added):

…one thing is crystal clear: Kashmiri Muslims are an unwanted lot outside Kashmir and the reasons are not difficult to fathom. One of the most notable reasons is that Kashmiri Muslims are considered a threat to national security; they are mentally bracketed with those involved in anti-national, subversive and terrorist activities. This is not a positive development by any yardstick.

Hence the question arises: what has created such a hostile environment for the common Kashmiri Muslims…? Who is responsible for the emergence of such a situation..? The answers are not far to seek.

The prosperous and well-entrenched Kashmiri leaders, without any exception, including innumerable separatists, who lead a luxurious and secure life both in the state and elsewhere in the country; who have set up big business houses in different parts of the country; who have palatial houses in Delhi and other big towns; who send their wards outside Kashmir so that they could be educated and trained in prestigious educational and professional institutions; whose sons and daughters hold important positions in the government and semi-government establishments outside the state, as also in multi-national companies; whose highly educated sons and daughters are working in the big media houses and cinema industry; and so on, are squarely responsible. They are responsible for the unfortunate incident at Prayag, and they are responsible for the kind of treatment common Kashmiri Muslims are being meted out in other parts of India at regular intervals.

…They are responsible because

• they have been demanding self-rule, or a step short of independence, or a mechanism that treats aggressor Pakistan equally with aggressed upon India in Indian-administered Jammu & Kashmir
• they are denouncing the Indian Army and other institutions located in Kashmir and demanding their withdrawal from the state
• they consistently oppose the presence of non-state subjects in the Kashmir Valley and have already rid the Valley of all non-Muslims
• they have been opposing tooth and nail the idea of (Hindu) refugees from West Pakistan obtaining all citizenship rights
• they are refusing to include the terms of “secularism” and “socialism” in the preamble of the State Constitution
• they are propagating that “Jammu & Kashmir State is a disputed area” and that “the accession of the state to India is conditional”
• they have been mal-treating the minorities in the state and pursuing a policy of discrimination with Jammu and Ladakh regions…

…If the Kashmiri leadership really wishes common Kashmiri Muslims to lead a dignified life and carry on their trading and other social activities elsewhere in the country in a peaceful environment, unhindered, it has to reform itself.

It has to say good bye to Islamabad…The Kashmiri leaders have to prove by deeds and words that they are for India and stands for national unity and integrity; that they will evolve and pursue policies which are holistic, all-embracing, state-centric and people-centric, and not Kashmir and a particular community-centric. There is no other way.

Also read: Time for a drastic overhaul in Kashmir and

An excellent factual background to the Kashmir Issue

Bonus post: Sandeep on why this is not freedom but an Islamic republic

The rest of the series: Don’t spoil the brat with more candies… , Is this man the biggest roadblock to peace in Kashmir valley? and Starting Point of a Solution

First, a strong case by Prof R Vaidyanathan on why our “kirana” stores need to be supported (emphasis added):

…More than 125 lakh kirana stores provide a source of livelihood to 16 crore people...The retail trade comprises all kinds of people and formats — from street vendors to departmental stores of various types, shapes and characteristics.

More than 80% of trade is accounted for by partnership and proprietorship forms — often called the unorganised sector. The kirana shop adjacent to my home opens at 7am and closes at 10pm every day, 365 days of the year. It is very efficient, and one can order through a mobile. The owner knows the tastes and price preferences of our family, but his business is classified as “unorganised” by our experts and national income data.

The footfall in his shop cannot be measured using western models (since there is no place for anybody to set foot inside his shop), and so he is derided and ignored. It is like clubbing housewives along with prostitutes in our census data to show them as unproductive citizens.

..The retail trade suffers from two major handicaps. One is the non-availability of credit at reasonable rates from institutions; the other is the bribe one has to pay to the government babus to leave him in peace.

…Large companies get loan rates below the prime lending rate, but my vegetable vendor gets it at 0.5% per day. They have to return 50 paise at the end of the day for every Rs100 borrowed in the morning. This will work out to be more than 180% per annum.

My retail provision stores man gets his money in an interesting way. He gets Rs45,000 (for a loan amount of Rs50,000) upfront and pays Rs500 a day for 100 days to repay his full Rs50,000. It turns out to be more than 10% for three months. More than 70% of the working capital requirements of retail trade in 2009-2010 came from non-bank sources.

The other perennial problem faced by the “unorganised” retail trade is the “organised” dacoity by minions of the state. They need to bribe the cops, bribe the municipal authorities and other local goons. The cost can be as high as Rs20 on an income of Rs200 or so per day. That is 10% of gross income. The same is true of fruit seller, the fast-food idli joint or the beauty parlour.

Read it in full here.

Next Sh A Surya Prakash raises some uncomfortable points about Naturalised citizens and national security (this is from 2004; emphasis added):

Some recent revelations about certain events pertaining to defence purchases and national security when Rajiv Gandhi was India’s Prime Minister, should, in my view, put citizens on high alert in regard to the possible dangers in allowing naturalised citizens to hold constitutional offices.

The most disturbing revelation is the one made by B.G. Deshmukh, a distinguished civil servant who was the Cabinet Secretary when Rajiv Gandhi was Prime Minister. In his book “A Cabinet Secretary Looks Back”, Deshmukh refers to a bizarre situation when he found Rajiv Gandhi wanting the Special Protection Group (SPG) to be trained in Italy and that too by persons unrelated to VIP security. Deshmukh’s narration of this episode is fully corroborated by B. Raman, a former Additional Director, RAW, who had referred to this unpleasant event in an article he wrote in The Statesman, six years ago.

In a nutshell, the story as narrated by these two citizens who held senior positions in the Union Government, runs as follows: All of a sudden, Rajiv Gandhi suggested that the SPG be sent to Italy for training even though the Italians have never been known for any specialisation in VIP security. Rajiv wanted the operation, which was to cost a quarter of a million US dollars, to be funded from RAW’s secret funds. Strangely, though it concerned the security of the Prime Minister, the arrangement was not with the Italian government or a governmental security agency.

Our SPG personnel were to be trained by some private agency. The deal had been arranged by a middleman who turned out to be Sonia Gandhi’s sister’s husband – a man called Walter Vinci. When Deshmukh and Raman protested, their objections were brushed aside and the deal was put through. Walter Vinci came to India, stayed in the Prime Minister’s house, and, according to SPG officials, had the temerity to scold and abuse them.

This is what Deshmukh himself has to say about the incident: “That the PM”s house had access to funds from abroad, I became aware in a very curious way – one of the security officers at 7, Race Course Road said one or two of them would be going to Italy for special training. I was rather upset as I had neither seen nor cleared the proposal. Rajiv wanted payments to be made from RAW’s secret funds to Sonia Gandhi’s Italian brother-in-law, a businessman, to train our SPG personnel”

The man who was entrusted with the job of handing over a quarter million dollars to the brother-in-law was S.E. Joshi, the chief of RAW. But Joshi had a major problem on his hands. Though it was earlier worked out that the Italian would collect the booty from the Geneva office of RAW, he told Joshi that he should deliver the agreed sum in Italian currency in Italy itself. The head of RAW told the Cabinet Secretary that it was inappropriate for the head of RAW to carry suitcases full of Italian currency half way across the world. It could lead to unforeseen complications.

Deshmukh says, he told Rajiv Gandhi that the arrangement suggested was not acceptable. “He (Rajiv Gandhi) flushed and told me to forget the whole affair. Later, I learnt that the PM’s house was asked to be more discreet with me. I also realised that in the Mughal-darbar-like functioning of the Gandhis, I had committed the cardinal sin of cross-checking with the king himself“

Read it in full here.

Next, Retired High Court Judge N Haridas asks whether the Supreme Court has over-stepped its limits in Amit Shah’s prosecution (emphasis added):

Under the laws of the land, both the Centre and the states are the ‘states.’ The law allows a state to prosecute an offender — whether it be a private citizen, an official or an elected representative, but the ‘top ruler’ is not an official in this respect. Here, the agitating question is: Can one state prosecute another state?

…Neither the Constitution of India nor the criminal procedure code has specifically empowered the courts with the power of prosecution. The power of the court to order a criminal prosecution is a power invented by the Indian courts which is supported neither by the English rule of law nor the burgeoning power of American judicial review.

…the Indian courts are not only ordering prosecutions but supervising and monitoring the investigation of the same. By tradition, history and practice, the prosecution of an offender is the sole job of the executive, namely, the cabinet.

…In the present case, the top ruler of the state, that is the chief minister, did not order Shah’s prosecution. Then, the supreme court interfered and ordered the prosecution of Shah in exercise of its power of judicial review. The court has ordered that the investigation and prosecution shall be conducted by the CBI which is the prosecuting arm of the Central government.

…One may take the high moral ground and ask whether a victim has any remedy at all when the all-powerful executive is allegedly shielding a criminal. But we must remember that the courts are only a corrective agency and when the executive or the legislature is bent on sabotaging a prosecution, there is no escape from it. Even when a court orders a prosecution, its progress and effectiveness depend on the goodwill of the executive and the resources at its command.

…In the Amit Shah case, as the Centre and the state of Gujarat are ruled by different political parties, the order to prosecute may find support from the Union executive. But suppose this prosecution was against a Congress party minister, the fate of such prosecution could have been different. The supreme court has established a very dangerous precedent by ordering the prosecution of a state minister by the CBI — an arm of the Union executive.

I will point out another dangerous aspect. As we all know, law and order is a state subject. Following the above logic, what prevents a state government from prosecuting a Central minister (in power) or even the prime minister? No law except the practice stands in the way. Of course, such an act will be devastating to the Centre-state relations, but that places the prime minister in the dock of a criminal. A dare-devil chief minister may do it.

Since law and order is a state subject and if a prime minister visiting state capital commits a crime (say, by smoking a cigar in the Raj Bhavan) why can’t he be prosecuted by the state? The supreme court through the Shah case is opening the law’s Pandora’s box.

And finally, Sh Ajit Doval (former Director, IB) writes about half-truths in the Sohrabuddin case (emphasis added):

Beware of half truths — because you may be holding the wrong half.

…it would be worthwhile to explore the real facts about Sohrabuddin, the nature of police encounters, and the real issues at stake. Sohrabuddin was an underworld gangster who was involved in nearly two dozen serious criminal offences in states of Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. He maintained transnational links with anti-India forces from the early ‘90s onwards, until his death in 2005. Working with mafia dons like Dawood Ibrahim and Abdul Latif, he procured weapons and explosives from Pakistan and supplied them to various terrorist and anti-national groups (had it not been for his activity, at least some terrorist acts could have been averted).

Sohrabuddin was solidly entrenched in the criminal world for a decade-and-a-half. Around the time he was killed, the Rajasthan government had announced a reward on his head.

In 1999, he had been detained under the National Security Act by the Madhya Pradesh government.

In a 1994 case investigated by the Ahmedabad crime branch, he was co-accused along with Dawood Ibrahim and convicted for five years, for waging war against the Government of India, planning an attack on the Jagannath rath yatra in Orissa, and other offences under the IPC, Arms Act, etc. During the investigation, 24 AK-56 rifles, 27 hand grenades, 5250 cartridges, 81 magazines and more were seized from his family home in Madhya Pradesh.

In 2004, a fourth crime was registered against him by Chandgad police station of Kolhapur district in Maharashtra under sections 302, 120 (b), and 25 (1) (3) of the Arms Act, for the killing of Gopal Tukaram Badivadekar. As fear of him often silenced people from reporting his whereabouts, let alone deposing against him, the Rajasthan government had to announce a reward on his head after he killed Hamid Lata in broad daylight in the heart of Udaipur, on December 31, 2004.

So much for Sohrabuddin’s innocence.

However, irrespective of who Sohrabuddin was and what he did, the use of unaccountable force against him is indefensible is the public view of many (often at variance with their private view).

There are many who feel that there is a higher rationale for such actions in compelling circumstances, as the law of the land has repeatedly found itself helpless in dealing with individuals bent on bleeding the country. Their argument, that the rule of law is a means to an end and not an end in itself, often finds support in the jurisprudential principles of salus populi est suprema lex (the people’s welfare is the supreme law) and salus res publica est suprema lex (the safety of the nation is supreme law).

Even the Supreme Court of India, in the case of D.K. Basu vs. State of West Bengal [1997 (1) SCC 416] accepted the validity of these two principles and characterised them as “not only important and relevant, but lying at the heart of the doctrine that welfare of an individual must yield to that of the community.” The validity of the principles of salus populi est suprema lex and salus res publica est suprema lex could have been part of an enlightened national discourse, and what could be the governing instrumentalities, empowerments, legal checks and stringent processes if these principles were to be invoked. It is better to accept reality as it is and then strive to change it for the better, rather than what we wish it to be.

Feigned ignorance is the worst type of hypocrisy.

But there is another vital question that needs to be addressed. While pursuing the Sohrabuddin case, was the government really serious about stopping the menace of fake encounters, or was it pursuing a different agenda?

…The other negative impact of the Sohrabuddin case is the impression it is creating that all encounters in which police and security forces are involved, are fake. Society needs to be reassured that the majority of encounters are genuine and mostly in response to murderous attacks on security personnel.The fact that, on average, over 1,200 policemen get killed every year grappling with terrorists, insurgents, underworld mafia and other anti-social elements, bears ample testimony to this fact.

…The other downside of the publicity around such cases is that it erodes the people’s trust in governance. Administrations begin to be seen as instruments of repression and self-aggrandisement and politicians as perceived as manipulating their power for political and personal gains. This erosion can lead to a dangerous delegitimisation of the polity.

Do read it in full here. Comments and thoughts welcome.

Past Weekend Readings are here.  Have a fruitful and productive week ahead. Stay safe, keep smiling.

The first is an excerpt from a keynote speech delivered by Sh Sam Pitroda on “India in a globalized world” at Nehru Centre, Mumbai (Thanks Prashant):

…Today, education is definitely on the national agenda. I believe that this is a great window of opportunity because we have a very large young population. We are prepared to invest on education. Our economy is growing at 8 to 10%. But, at the same time, don’t have big dreams that India will become a superpower. I think that we have a lot of work related to disparity, development and poverty. On the one hand, we have this great need for education. On the other hand, we have 300 million people who are illiterate. Our cities are basically dying. We do not have the right infrastructure. We don’t have enough power, we will have water shortages. There are a whole lot of issues that we need to deal with.

But, at the same time, we do have a unique position in the world because the world is going through a crisis of a different kind. This is mainly because the US model based on consumption is being questioned. We have reached a point where that model is not scalable, sustainable or workable. You cannot go on buying things all the time. When the US data comes from retailers during Christmas or Thanksgiving, we find that the world gets all excited if the US spends a lot of money. So people in Korea, China, Taiwan, India feel good. You cannot have 300 million people driving world economy any more. It was acceptable fifty years ago when the wealth was concentrated only in one part of the world. Today, there are a billion people in China, a billion in India and almost a billion in the former Soviet Union. These three billion have the same aspirations as Americans or Europeans. They also want all of the same goods and services. As a result, the Western model of consumption cannot be sustained and this is especially true after the recession.

India will have to evolve a new model…if India has to have a place in the global world, it will, in turn, look for and ultimately evolve a new model of consumption. India has the diversity, the mass, the momentum that is needed to give a new direction to the world.

We have answers in many areas. For example, in health, we cannot go on building expensive hospitals with fancy equipment and high cost surgery rooms and still meet the needs of this country in terms of health cost. We have to go back at some time to use some of our traditional wisdom mainly because there are 12,000 herbal medicinal plants which are unique to Indian climate. Our great grandfathers and grandmothers knew some of these formulas. Some of them worked, some of them didn’t work. We need to go back and look in our tradition and evolve low-cost models.

…Let’s start with education. Education, as we understand it today, essentially implies duster, blackboard, chalk, teacher, classroom, textbook, examinations, grades, certificates…This is based on the way I learnt 50-60 years ago. Today, to learn, one does not need any of this…Who decided that it should take four years to get a degree? For some reason, the entire world follows that. What does a degree really mean? Do you need a degree to do a job?

…Our systems don’t allow that. Our educational systems are not designed to give that seamless flexibility. We are all wound up in trying to promote higher education. But it is all useless.

…If we focus on innovations, if we focus on new infrastructure, if we focus on young talent, I think we will definitely find our place in the globalized world. We cannot make a dent until we address our own basic challenges of disparity, demography and development with a focus on the people at the bottom of the pyramid and inclusive growth.

***

Next, excerpts from Those tears of doom (Thanks Sanjay):

…As I write this, legislators in Karnataka are rushing to declare their bank statement and property to Justice Nitte Santosh Hegde, the state’s ombudsman against corruption. By Tuesday, more than 80 of 224 members of the legislative assembly, including the chief minister, had filed statements of their wealth. The rest were scrambling to do so. If they didn’t, warned the 70-year-old Justice Hegde, a former hockey player, he would not hesitate to recommend a six-month jail term for defaulters.

Don’t get too excited. Justice Hegde resigned last week, partly because the government won’t let him do anymore than recommend.

…When he was appointed as a watchdog against official corruption nearly four years ago, Hegde appeared to have impeccable credentials in a state where one coalition partner was the right-wing BJP, which now runs Karnataka with its old slogan, a ‘party with a difference’. As a Kannadiga, previously a judge of the Supreme Court — as was his father, who made an unusual journey from India’s highest court to Speaker of the sixth Lok Sabha — and a family history tied to the Sangh parivar, Hegde could have made that difference.

Instead, Hegde plunged Bangalore and Karnataka into shock last week as he made a vocal and highly publicised exit as Lokayukta…

The immediate provocation for Hegde’s resignation was a fiddle brazen even by Karnataka’s grand standards: the clandestine shipping of half a million tonnes of impounded iron ore from Belekeri port, 520 km northwest of Bangalore. On Hegde’s orders, Deputy Conservator of Forests R. Gokul had captured the ore in June, along with 40 sacks of forged documents, indicating official connivance and a revenue loss of about Rs 250 crore. Hegde quit when, instead of supporting Gokul, the government tried to stop him. “If I had not resigned, Gokul would have been suspended,” said Hegde. Larger issues frustrated Hegde. None of the officials he charged with corruption ever stood trial. Some are back on the job. No government, state or central, allows Lokayuktas the freedom to go beyond investigation. Permission to prosecute officials and politicians caught with their hand in the till must come from the government. It rarely does.

***

And finally, excerpt from a news-report on “Six Bangladeshis held with fake documents” – not on the border but in far-away Pune, at least 2000 kms from the border (Thanks Vasu-ji):

Pune: Six Bangladeshi nationals have been arrested by the special operations wing (SoW) of the Pune crime branch for staying in India illegally. An Indian national, who helped them forge documents and obtain Indian PAN cards, has also been arrested. (http://epaper.timesofindia.com, date: 1.7.10)

…The police..recovered a fake school leaving certificate…and a pan card…

Gholap had allegedly taken Rs 500 each from the Bangladeshi nationals to provide them with fake documents.

Assistant public prosecutor D L More told the court that custodial interrogation of the suspects was required to find out how they travelled to Pune, who their associates were and how they had come in possession of fake documents.

More asked for time to conduct investigations in West Bengal and to find out whether the suspects were linked with terror organisations.

Try not to worry too much…Enjoy the weekend and please do join the Live Chat tomorrow on News, Mainstream Media and Prejudices (430pm IST). I’m looking forward to chatting with many of you online.

Some Weekend Readings from the past:

Some links for weekend reading – IV (June 2008)

Links and extracts for weekend reading (July 2008)