Gaza: Where is Humanity?

Pic: BBC online
Up until the second week of the war more than 750 Palestinians were killed and thousands injured. This is the highest Palestinian toll in four decades of occupation, and the figure is expected to be much bigger when a ceasefire is finally called. The few hospitals in Gaza, already under strain on account of the blockade, have not been able to cope with the tragedy. Israeli helicopter gunships have gone to the extent of targeting ambulances carrying the injured. Ehab Mahbub, a Palestinian doctor, was killed when his ambulance was hit by an Israeli missile. The appeals for blood are getting more and more desperate.

Karen Abu Zayed, the Commissioner for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), said the need for aid “has never been so acute”. The media, both Israeli and international, have been kept out of Gaza despite an Israeli Supreme Court directive to the government to allow the media to cover the unfolding human catastrophe. The United States and other Western countries, which otherwise are great votaries of free media, have not been complaining too much about this.
“Disastrous” situation
Before the invasion, a spokesman for the UNRWA described the humanitarian situation in Gaza as “disastrous” and said the agency was unable to get medical supplies into Gaza for more than a year because of Israel’s blockade of the border crossings.

In 2008, the Israeli Supreme Court, behaving as an appendage of the state, ruled that the government was authorised to limit the supply of electricity, petrol and diesel to Gaza since these “diminished quantities sufficiently meet humanitarian needs”. The Supreme Court also sanctioned collective punishment for the hapless people almost a year ago. Collective punishment is prohibited under international law. “If the residents of the Gaza Strip deserve to be punished because of the Qassam rockets, then maybe all Israelis need to be punished because of the occupation,” prominent Israeli commentator Gideon Levy wrote in a recent article. The Jewish state, with the tacit support of sections of the Palestinian Authority and neighbouring Arab states, tried first to starve Gazans into submission. They had hoped that the population would rise in revolt and throw out the Hamas-led government. When that blueprint did not materialise, Israel prepared for a military assault to get rid of Hamas and other militant groups in Gaza. These are the only groups that are keeping the flag of resistance still flying in the occupied territories. A senior Israeli army officer told The New York Times that the purpose of the invasion was to “make Hamas either lose their will or lose their weapons”.

The U.N. has also not covered itself in glory as Israel keeps on violating all established international norms with impunity. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon has not explicitly condemned the targeting of civilian neighbourhoods. The Security Council has failed even to come out with a statement mildly censoring Israel. Instead, the U.N. has played into Israel’s hands by calling for “restraint” on both sides. In doing so, it has put Israel, which has the most powerful army in the region, and the Hamas militia, which operates under the jackboot of the occupation, on the same footing.



As Hannan Ashrawi, Palestinian political activist and member of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation, (PLO) said, the international community should have realised a long time ago that it is the Israeli occupation and the continuous brutalisation of Palestinians that is the root cause of the conflict. In the past seven years, more than 5,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli army. The Israeli toll during the same period was 14 civilians, killed mainly by rocket fire. On the first day of the Israeli “death from above” campaign, more than 300 Palestinian civilians were killed. The Israeli army announced that it had dropped 100 tonnes of bombs in the first nine hours of the operation.


MASSIVE VIOLATION
Professor Richard Falk, the U.N. rapporteur to the occupied territories, said in the first week of January that the Israeli attack on Gaza represented a severe and massive violation of international humanitarian law as defined by the Geneva Conventions regarding the obligations of an occupying power and the requirements of the laws of war.

The eminent American expert on international law also noted that Israel had ignored recent Hamas initiatives to re-establish the military truce after it expired on December 26. According to Falk, the Israeli military invasion and the catastrophic human toll it has caused “challenge those countries that have been and remain complicit, either directly or indirectly, in Israel’s violation of international law”.

This complicity, said Falk, extended to those countries knowingly providing military equipment for these illegal attacks. The U.S. is no doubt the main provider of arms for the Zionist state, but some other countries, such as India, are also filling its coffers, helping it to spread terror in the region. Israel is all set to supplant Russia as the biggest supplier of arms to India. In November, just as Israel was getting ready to invade Gaza, a high-level Indian delegation was in Tel Aviv to firm up multi-billion-dollar defence contracts. It is well known that Mossad and the Israeli state-controlled armaments industry have a big stake in all these defence deals.

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) and other Left parties have appealed to the Indian government to at least snap defence links with Israel in the wake of the Gaza invasion. President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela has shown the way to world leaders by expelling Israel’s Ambassador to his country. In a televised address, he compared Israel’s invasion of Gaza to the “holocaust” against Jews during the Second World War. He said the President of Israel and the President of the U.S. should be taken together to the International Criminal Court. “How sad that Israel continues to act as the assassin’s arm of the Yankee Empire,” Chavez said.

After flattening Gaza with bombs and missiles fired from their planes and helicopter gunships, Israel sent its elite troops, backed by heavy armour, into the territory. It dropped 1,000-kg bombs to flatten entire neighbourhoods and to prepare the ground for the advance of its troops.

Ceasefire efforts
After the attack on the U.N. school building, the efforts to bring about a ceasefire have intensified. A joint French-Egyptian initiative, which calls on Israel to withdraw and Hamas to stop firing rockets, has been supported by the U.S. in the U.N. Security Council. United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has, however, not called for a halt to the Israeli military operations even after the wilful targeting of the U.N. school. Both Israeli and Hamas leaderships have said they are studying the French-Egyptian proposals seriously.

The Israeli government announced on January 7 that the military would stop shooting for three hours every day to allow essential humanitarian supplies into Gaza. But the Israeli army also stated that it would respond immediately to any provocations. As of the second week of January, the Israeli establishment has indicated that it wants to continue the military offensive despite demands from the international community for an immediate ceasefire. Meanwhile, the defiant Hamas rocket-fire continues, underlining the fact that the Israeli war machine has not been able to achieve its stated goal of disarming Hamas fighters so far.

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Unequal citizens

IT was December 3, 2008, yet another World Disability Day. Around 5,000 disabled people gathered at India Gate in New Delhi and lit candles and raised their hands together for the spirit of unity. There was not a sigh on their lips, nor was there any optimistic grin on their faces. It seemed as if the flicker of the flames conveyed their emotions. The stepmotherly response to the demands of the disabled over the years and the lack of political will to get them better access to mainstream life had only strengthened their resolve. A night-long vigil had been planned by the Disabled Rights Group (DRG) but was changed to a solidarity vigil after the terror attacks in Mumbai. The message was clear: no charity, only rights. The vigil was part of an ongoing struggle across the country. The DRG is a conglomeration of all non-governmental organisations working for the rights of the disabled population in the country. It has three major demands. First, all Ministries should have a disability plan. Second, 3 per cent of each Ministry’s budget should be spent on its plans for the disabled. Third, the Disability Division, which is at present under the Ministry of Social Justice, should be upgraded, preferably as a separate ministry. Javed Abidi, convener of the DRG, told: “We have been pursuing our demands for more than a decade. Ironically, the government has agreed to most of our demands, but they still remain on paper. The Disability Act [The Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995] and recommendations in the Eleventh Plan that were passed more than a year ago are positive, but no steps have been taken to implement them.” Clause 6.187 of the Eleventh Plan states that within six months of the Plan’s approval, every Ministry should have a plan for the empowerment of disabled people. It also says that 3 per cent of the budget of every Ministry should be allocated for people with disabilities and that monitoring mechanisms should be set up at various levels to check the progress in this regard. Along with these provisions, Clause 6.188 states: “The ‘Disability Division’ of the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment shall be strengthened with the status of separate ‘Department’, so that they can effectively liaise with all the concerned Ministries/Departments and ensure that they fulfil their responsibilities towards disabled persons, including financial support enjoined on them.”

The Disability Act, too, has many progressive initiatives. For example, it makes provision for the appointment of a Disability Commissioner who would autonomously deal with issues related to disabled people.

India was the seventh country to ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, on October 1, 2007, but activists think that the government has been extending only token support.

For instance, the U.N. convention talks of sign language as an official language that needs to be developed and recognised. The Indian Disability Act does not take this into account. Most websites in India are still not disabled-friendly even though the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has come out with guidelines on the subject. While Indian software companies design disabled-friendly websites for other countries, they do not do so for India. Most buildings and public transport are still not accessible to the disabled people despite government regulations.“The problem is lack of awareness. Violation of the W3C guidelines has resulted in severe penalties in other countries. We do not want people to be punished, but at least we want Indian officials to be reactive to our cause, if not proactive. Think of it, there was no Disability Commissioner for three years after the Indian Disability Act was passed, and since the appointment was made, the officials have been noted more for their compliance with the government than for their concern for the needs of disabled people,” Abidi said. The disability movement in India has been gathering massive support for the last two decades, and its campaign has been, more than anything, about self-respect and the demand for disabled people to be treated as equal citizens, without charitable tokenisms. The fight is for greater access as the movement’s history indicates.

The rights of disabled people were first recognised by Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who announced 3 per cent reservation for them in 1977. But the announcement was humiliating as the reservation was announced only in C and D category jobs. This provision remained unchallenged for the next two decades.

When Rajiv Gandhi became Prime Minister, he recognised disability as a core issue. He appointed a committee under the chairmanship of Justice Baharul Islam. The committee gave its report in 1988. The Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act was finally passed by Parliament in December 1995 during the tenure of the Congress government led by P.V. Narasimha Rao. It was notified on February 7, 1996. This time reservation was extended to A and B category jobs and was also increased to 5 per cent.

After a massive public campaign, the Government of India finally included disability as a category in Census 2001. According to Census 2001, over 21 million people in India suffer from one or other kind of disability. This is equivalent to 2.1 per cent of the population. There is, however, the U.N. Manual for the Development of Statistical Information for Disability Programmes and Policies 1996 estimate, which pegs the population of disabled in India beyond 6 per cent and also predicts that its percentage could be a double-digit figure. The only attempt to study the disabled population in India made before this was in 1991, when a National Sample Survey was conducted. It pegged the population of disabled people at 1.9 per cent.

The campaign also resulted in valuable inductions in the Eleventh Plan as has been stated earlier.

The campaign took note of the low population of disabled people employed in both public and private sectors. A survey carried out in 1999 by the National Centre for Promotion of Employment of Disabled People found that despite the 5 per cent reservation, the percentage of the disabled in the workforce ranged from 0.01 per cent to 0.99 per cent. Multinational companies showed the abysmal figure of 0.05 per cent. The public sector fared little better, with disabled people constituting only 0.54 per cent of its workforce.Clause 41 of Chapter 6 (entitled “Employment”) of the Disability Act states that incentives should be given “to employers both in the public and private sectors to ensure that at least 5 per cent of their workforce is composed of persons with disabilities”. But the government has not yet proposed any such incentive plans. To top it all, nothing can be done if the legislation is violated as the Act has no penalty clause. The disability movement stands at a crucial juncture at present. Its activists believe that lobbying for greater access at various levels should continue but more importance should be given to fighting for policy interventions. The reason why this decision came so late, as Abidi puts it, was their naivety.

Discrimination against the disabled in government agencies and in the private sector was appalling when they started the movement. Initially, Abidi and his team lobbied the private sector to give them representation but complaints started coming in that there were hardly any skilled workers to fill the statutory quota. This led to the realisation that intervening at the policy level was necessary so that education was made accessible to those with disabilities. With this orientation, the movement also started looking into the rural hinterland, where disabled people are more severely hit than elsewhere because of the lack of even the minimum of facilities.

“Even today, if you look at the buildings of the colleges in any of the central universities, they are inaccessible to a paraplegic. What is the use of reservation if the universities are not physically accessible?” Abidi asked.He said that neither education nor employment was possible without access and none of the three was possible without proper implementation of the legislation.“What we want is a paradigmatic shift in the way problems of disabled people are seen. Equal citizenship is what every civilised society stands for, then why not us?” he added.

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2008: The World Year of Extremes

The year 2008 can be called a year of extremes: it saw huge trauma, beginning in the shadow of the assassination of former Pakistani prime minister Benazir Bhutto just days earlier and ending with a global market crisis that has brought despair to millions across the world. Yet the worst is still to come.
The final months of the year were marred by attacks, with hundreds dead in India's bustling commercial metropolis Mumbai, chaos in Thailand, pirates in the Gulf of Aden and continuing violence in the world's top conflict regions, Iraq and Afghanistan.The Middle East is still far from a peaceful solution between Israelis and Palestinians, or indeed between Palestinians and Palestinians. Russia and Georgia erupted into a war just as the world was watching the glittery opening of the skillfully staged Olympics in China. In Italy, Silvio Berlusconi is again prime minister.

In Zimbabwe, expectations for better government were withering even faster than President Robert Mugabe's regime could print ever higher dollar bills to stem inflation.

The risks of global warming are worse than ever as concerns about the world climate were drowned out by concerns about the world economy.

The death toll in the five-year war in Congo has passed the five-million mark and continues to be largely neglected by the international community.

Yet in the midst of all the bad news of 2008, there was also reason for hope, and indeed some genuinely good news.

Worry over the world's tumbling markets brought leaders across the world racing to one table at previously unheard of speed to search for ways out of the crisis.

The European Union, usually a prime example of snail-speed diplomacy, managed to broker at least a ceasefire in Georgia and a return to - although still difficult - diplomacy between Russia and its Western neighbors.

After years of half-hearted pursuit, former Serbian leader Radovan Karadzic is finally being brought to trial over war crimes.

Serious progress has been made in research on illnesses such as HIV/AIDS, which have seen millions dead especially in Africa.

Even the fiercest critics agree that Iraq has seen some genuine security improvements and is now inching towards a reduction in US troops.

Coming up to Christmas, the year ended with the appearance of what many cast as a political messiah: Barack Obama was elected the first black president of the US.

The world - desperate for a change after eight years of George W. Bush calamities - celebrated the news not just in the US, but also in Africa, European capitals and in the Arab world.

The incoming US president is inheriting a global financial crisis, two wars and a whole series of international relations in tatters.

As heavy as Obama's new presidential burden is, problems like the global market crisis have brought the focus of the world's leading players back to the need for pragmatic talk, listening and the need for multilateral conflict resolution.

There may not be stardom for anybody, but there is certainly hope in that.

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Real Boss

It could have been a scene out of Stanley Kubrick’s Dr Strangelove except that the hoax call almost triggered a real war between India and Pakistan. On November 28, even as Indian security forces battled the remaining terrorists holed up in the Taj Mahal hotel in Mumbai, Pakistan President Asif Zardari received a call from India stating that External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee wanted to speak to him urgently. No one is clear whether the protocols for screening such calls were followed and ‘Mukherjee’ was put through. He reportedly threatened Pakistan with military retaliation if they did not rein in the terrorist groups responsible for the Mumbai attacks. A concerned Zardari is said to have called up the armed forces and put them on high alert. India was puzzled by the sudden build-up.The mystery was solved only when visiting US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice questioned Mukherjee as to why he had made such a threatening call. A mystified Mukherjee denied ever having made it and said the only person he spoke to was his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi, who was in India that time, and that too from a prepared text which had no warnings of an Indian retribution. Rice conveyed the information to Zardari and the situation was defused. A visibly irritated Mukherjee pointed out, “It is worrying that a neighbouring state might even consider action on the basis of such a hoax call.” Stephen P. Cohen, an American expert on relations between India and Pakistan, believes that in every major crisis between the two countries, including the four wars they had fought, there was a serious error of judgment. He regards the hoax call and Pakistan’s reaction to it as one such. The international ridicule and concern apart, the incident damaged Zardari and Pakistan’s credibility in the eyes of the Indian leadership. And blasted any hopes of the two working jointly towards dealing with the new threat that the brazen terror attacks on Mumbai posed.
Yet, the previous day there was an even more significant error of judgment that Zardari and his government headed by Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani had made, which in the eyes of many experts led to the unraveling of the plot behind the Mumbai attacks. In his brief call to Manmohan expressing his concern about the attacks, Gilani had offered to send the director-general of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Agency to assist in the investigations. By the next morning, Gilani, under pressure from army chief General Ashfaq Pervez Kiyani, backtracked on his offer and said only a director-level officer would be sent. Zardari explained it away as a “miscommunique”. But it was signal to India and the world that it was Kiyani, not Zardari, who was really calling the shots in Pakistan.It was evident that under pressure from Kiyani and his brass, Zardari’s conciliatory and empathetic tone soon gave way to bellicosity as he spearheaded Pakistan’s shrill campaign of outright denial for any responsibility for the Mumbai attacks, even dismissing arrested terrorist Ajmal Amir Kasab, as a “stateless individual”. Zardari then categorically ruled out handing over terrorists on India’s most wanted list and suspected to have taken shelter in Pakistan such as Dawood Ibrahim, the Mumbai don and Maulana Masood Azhar, the Jaish-e-Mohammad chief. Under pressure from the US, Pakistan did wilt and arrest the Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) chief Zakiur Rahman Lakhvi apart from detaining Azhar. But Pakistani leaders reiterated that those arrested would be tried under their law and not be extradited to India. For New Delhi, it was a familiar ploy that would see them being freed after a few months for lack of evidence.
The big message for India: The army is back in control in Pakistan. The fledgling democratic government had become inconsequential in its response to the unfolding crisis. From now on it was Kiyani not Zardari who would have the final say on the future direction that Pakistan would take. A senior Indian official termed it dramatically as, “declaration of the Pakistan Army of its independence.” There is now nothing stopping Kiyani from directly taking charge of governance in Pakistan. But unlike Pervez Musharraf, his predecessor, he has shown no inclination of staging a bloodless coup or taking over as President. Not yet. For the moment he remains content of letting the world know who the real boss of Pakistan is.Long time Pakistan Army watcher Michael Krepon of the Washington DC-based Stimson Center believes “there never really has been a fundamental shift in power in Pakistan” despite the democratic elections in March, 2008. The army, which is the most organised institution in Pakistan, has always been in control of its affairs especially on national security. Krepon doesn’t believe that Kiyani has staged a coup through the backdoor. Instead he argues that Kiyani is only engaged in “balancing pressing external demands with internal security dilemmas.”For India though, the emergence of Kiyani as the real centre of power has serious implications. Given the meticulous way the Mumbai attacks were planned and then executed, it was clear to Indian investigators that this was a commando-type operation that possibly had the involvement of a state actor. With Kasab singing about his LeT and ISI handlers and physical evidence mounting in terms of satellite phone calls, equipment and boats used for the attack, Pakistan’s hand seemed to be smeared all over it. Even Rice told Zardari firmly that the US had evidence to show the links. India, like much of the world, is willing to believe that Zardari and his civilian establishment were probably not involved in sanctioning such a heinous act. But with ISI’s hand or at least that of its “alumnus” in the form of retired officers being seen, the analysis is that the army may be deeply involved in the plot.
The reason the army and therefore, Kiyani, has emerged as the prime suspect is that it stands to gain most from the outcome of the Mumbai attacks. The Pakistan Army has been under tremendous pressure after 9/11 with Musharraf making commitments to crack down on terror groups and go after the Al Qaeda. To keep the brass on board he claimed that the US had promised to put pressure on India to come out with an acceptable solution on Kashmir. He committed over 1,00,000 troops to defend its borders with Afghanistan. But then US demands kept mounting. First it was to deliver the Al Qaeda operatives. Then it was to go after the Taliban, followed by orders to ‘get their leaders’. As pressure mounted to “deliver quality instead of just quantity” the credibility of Musharraf and the Pakistan’s army took a beating. The army was seen as fighting America’s war against fellow Islamists and internal unrest grew.
Musharraf compounded it by clinging to power and trying to muzzle the judiciary into compliance— a move that galvanised civil society against him. Musharraf had to go. So the presidency was distanced from the army with Kiyani taking over as the army chief in November 2007.
Meanwhile, to the army’s growing concern, internal security had deteriorated with rebellions breaking out in Balochistan and North West Frontier Province. Extremist groups with the exception of the LeT were turning against the army and there were even attempts on Musharraf’s life. Worse, Pakistan had its own Taliban to deal with. Suicide attacks and bomb blasts had become the norm. For the first time in the army’s history, there were reports of desertions of some 900 of its personnel in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) region. Morale was at an all-time low.When he took over as chief, for a while Kiyani made the right noises that reassured the US and India. He wanted his generals to pull out of all political assignments and focus on the army’s primary duty of defending the nation. As a political observer said, “It was a shrewd move because the army by then had become highly unpopular and some of its officers were openly corrupt.” He then cleverly colluded with
Zardari to oust Musharraf from the presidency. Zardari, after taking over as President in September, began threatening the establishment by starting a whole new narrative on relations between India and Pakistan. He talked of not being burdened by the baggage of the past and stated that “India was not a threat to Pakistan,” even dreaming of a visa-free regime between the two countries. He expansively offered “a no first use” of nuclear weapons agreement to India that had the army brass gnashing its teeth.
Pakistan’s army doctrine in recent years rested on the premise that as long as India feared a nuclear first strike by Islamabad, it would not want to engage with its neighbour in a full-scale war. Both, the1999 Kargil War and the 2001 Parliament attack had affirmed to Pakistan that India was chary of waging a full-fledged war with it. Zardari did a quick U-turn on his no first use offer after Kiyani reportedly ticked him off.Kiyani, meanwhile, had begun asserting his independence. When the new government under Gilani came to power in March it passed an order bringing the ISI under the control of the Interior Ministry. Within days, the Government hastily rescinded the order, after Kiyani lit into them.
Then when American predator drones began making attacks inside Pakistani territory, Kiyani threatened to blow them out of the sky if they violated his country’s airspace again. He had begun asserting his clout to prove that he was not “America’s general.”. Yet the army remained unpopular and the new democratic dispensation a potential threat to its dominance. So experts believed that the army headed by Kiyani was looking for “a one-shot solution”: Target India. Nothing unites Pakistan like a confrontation with India which also brings the army to the forefrontThe Mumbai attacks must be seen in this light. If India acts on expected lines, it would produce the desired results for the Pakistani army. Already there is a rallying cry across Pakistan to stand as one and that includes the fundamentalists (see box on Pakistan’s options). Everyone now looks upon Kiyani and the army as the only hope to counter an aggressive India. The peace process is on hold and is in danger of breaking down altogether.
If India turns the heat on, Kiyani can legitimately pull his troops out from the unpopular war they are conducting on the Afghan front and reposition them on the Indian border. It would also force the US to intervene and give President-elect Barack Obama an excuse to appoint a special envoy like Bill Richardson to mediate on Kashmir between India and Pakistan. Such a move is certain to sour the strong relations that India and US have built up after the nuclear deal. All these developments would eminently suit both Kiyani and Pakistan.
Kiyani is no Musharraf, but then that is possibly one of his strengths. Shuja Nawaz, author of Crossed Swords: Pakistan: Its Army and the Wars Within, who has interacted with Kiyani says that unlike Musharraf, “who was quick in making decisions and possibly impetuous too, Kiyani is more deliberate and collegiate in his approach.” An avid golfer, Kiyani, 56, is a chain smoker and as another observer put it, “More Pakistani and less cosmopolitan than Musharraf.” Growing up in a working class family (his father was a junior commissioned officer in the army) Kiyani was considered “a thoroughly professional officer” not given to flamboyance. He was the late Benazir Bhutto’s deputy military attaché during her first tenure as prime minister in 1988. When Musharraf usurped power, Kiyani, because of his unquestioned loyalty, had his complete trust. Kiyani was even made ISI chief and, after the assassination attempt on Musharraf, impressed him by bringing the perpetrators to book. His ascension to the top post was seen as a chance for the Pakistan Army to regain its professionalism. Says Cohen, “He is seen as straightforward person—someone who wants to keep the army out of politics.”
Nawaz believes that there is “no dissonance” between Islamabad and Rawalpindi and that the civilian and military leadership is pulling together. He asserts, “They both don’t want a confrontation with India. Kiyani is trying to break the army out of the stereotypes and moulds that it is usually portrayed in.” Ashley Tellis, a senior fellow at Carnegie, believes that Kiyani’s assertion over the ISI was limited to telling the political leadership not to trample on what he considered the army’s “prerogative.” Nawaz discounts the notion that the Pakistan Army is keen to pull out of the Afghan front, stating that the war there is as important for the country’s unity and integrity. Cohen agrees: “Moving troops from the Afghan border to the Indian front is like turning the Queen Elizabeth around—it would take a long time doing.”
Yet many Indian experts believe there is much in the Mumbai attacks and its motivations that need explaining. They are convinced that Kiyani and Pakistan played a diabolical role in the attacks and their strategy will become more evident in the months ahead. India faces a major dilemma in its course of action.
It wants the Pakistani army to remain engaged on the Afghan front because it suits India to have the extremists tamed rather than fight in Kashmir. India also doesn’t want to play into jihadi hands and create a crisis that would push the Pakistan Army to the forefront. Also, unlike in 2001 India realises it is not dealing with, “one Pakistan as it was under Musharraf. It has now become a conglomerate of institutions and individuals that has made it almost dysfunctional—a failed state.” With so many divisive forces, Pakistan could easily implode.Nor is India likely to be satisfied with assurances or token arrests of heads of terror groups. “We are not in the word business anymore. We need targeted response from Pakistan—we want to see outcomes and we are willing to think it through,” said a senior official.
He pointed out that the Bangladesh war, which dismembered Pakistan, took over a year of preparation. That included India making an international case for the refugees pouring across its borders, signing a treaty with Soviet Union to neutralise the US, building the Mukti Bahini to fight as a liberation force and carefully marshalling its own armed forces to make decisive strikes in Pakistan. “These are defining moments and you don’t do them overnight. Patience and planning is the key,” he says.
India has to be clear of its end goal which usually translates to what kind of Pakistan does India want. Should Pakistan be to India what Canada is to the US? Does India want a stable Pakistan but not a strong one? Does it want to see the further dismemberment of Pakistan? Does it want to put terrorists operating out of Pakistan out of business? Does it want it to be like Jinnah’s Pakistan that L.K. Advani advocated? Or does it want to prove a limited political and psychological point? After determining its objective, what is key for India is not being predictable but looking for smart options.Getting international pressure put on Pakistan would help. Armed with growing evidence gathered from intelligence agencies investigating the Mumbai attacks, India has mounted a global diplomatic initiative to get Islamabad to hand over some of these fugitives. According to intelligence reports, Dawood was recently admitted at the Army Hospital in Rawalpindi for a kidney illness which has been shared with the US. India then made a strong intervention at the UN Security Council on December 9, on a debate on terrorism asking for the council to ban Jamaat-ud-Daawa, the new front organisation of the LeT, which it did.
Officials say the arrested LeT leaders should be handed over to India. Pakistan uses both the leaders and the terror group as one of its main lines of defence against India and is therefore wary of handing over assets it has built over the years.
If the UPA Government manages to force Pakistan to hand them over, it will be a major step in tackling terrorism. It would also be a deft political move with general elections looming.
India also continues to maintain that it “is keeping all options open”, including a military strike. But as Tellis points out, “A military strike is the first move but it’s not going to be the last one.” India must now be acutely aware there is an ambitious general in Pakistan waiting for us to make a false step.

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Afghanistan: impact of civilians killed by U.S./U.K.

Informants often give bad information either accidentally or because they are pursuing tribal or personal vendettas Relatives of those killed have joined the Taliban because they want to avenge their brothers, fathers or cousins
It was 7.30 on a hot July morning when the plane came swooping low over the remote ravine. Below, a bridal party was making its way to the groom’s village in an area called Kamala, in the eastern province of Nangarhar, to prepare for the celebrations later that day. The first bomb hit a large group of children who had run on ahead of the main procession. It killed most of them instantly. A few minutes later, the plane returned and dropped another bomb, right in the centre of the group. This time the victims were almost all women. Somehow the bride and two girls survived but as they scrambled down the hillside, desperately trying to get away from the plane, a third bomb caught them. Hajj Khan was one of four elderly men escorting the bride’s party that day.

“We were walking, I was holding my grandson’s hand, then there was a loud noise and everything went white. When I opened my eyes, everybody was screaming. I was lying metres from where I had been, I was still holding my grandson’s hand but the rest of him was gone. I looked around and saw pieces of bodies everywhere. I couldn’t make out which part was which.” Relatives from the groom’s village said it was impossible to identify the remains. They buried the 47 victims in 28 graves. Stories like this are relatively common in today’s Afghanistan. More than 600 civilians have died in NATO and U.S. air strikes this year. The number of innocents killed this way has almost doubled from last year, and tripled from the year before that. These attacks are weakening support for the Afghan government and turning more and more people against the foreign occupation of the country.

“If things were going OK maybe we could accept the occasional mistake. But with the economy the way it is, the worsening security situation, and the lack of development — when they kill civilians on top of everything else, it’s too much for people,” says Jahid Mohseni who runs Tolo TV, Afghanistan’s most popular television station, with his two brothers. The U.S. military initially denied any civilians had been killed in the Kamala bombing but later said they were investigating the incident. When asked this week for an explanation of events on that morning in July, the U.S. military in Afghanistan said they were unfamiliar with the specifics but would look into it.

The latest figures from the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission, taken a month ago, suggest about 750 civilians have been killed by foreign forces this year. Most were killed in air strikes. The remainder were shot by jumpy soldiers, who often open fire in crowded public places after an attack on one of their convoys.

Humanitarian aid agencies say privately that they believe the figure is significantly higher, as many victims classed as “insurgents” are actually non-combatants.

As the situation deteriorates across the country, the killing of civilians is seen as a final affront in a litany of mistakes by the foreign forces in Afghanistan. Patience among ordinary Afghans has worn thin and anger grows with each attack.

In July this year hundreds of Afghans took to the street in Nangarhar province after the air strike on the wedding party. The riots turned violent as protesters raged against the foreign occupiers and the government they support. The army eventually had to be called in to quell the rioting.

Civilian casualties are not new to Nangarhar province — last year a convoy of U.S. Marines hit by a bomb attack subsequently opened fire in a bazaar killing 16 people. The marines involved were sent home and their officers charged, but a subsequent ruling cleared them of responsibility for the deaths.

NATO and U.S. spokesmen say their forces go to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties. But all too often after an air strike, they deny civilians are among the dead or claim far fewer were killed.

A recent Human Rights Watch report said U.S. investigations, when launched, have been “unilateral, ponderous, and lacking in transparency, undercutting rather than improving relations with local populations and the Afghan government.”

The routine denials and hands-off attitude are contributing to a growing sense among Afghans that their lives are cheap in the eyes of the foreigners.

“We know they don’t intend to kill the civilians but we don’t believe they care enough not to,” said Ahmad Zia, a jeweller in Kabul’s busy bazaar. “If it continues we will see a lot more people joining the fight against the foreigners. It’s inevitable.”

The accidental targeting of wedding parties in Afghanistan has only deepened resentment. Last month 27 people were killed when a wedding party was bombed near Kandahar. It was the third wedding party to be hit this year alone. He says many of the incidents result when planes are brought in to protect forces coming under fire. “Their troops are in trouble so they call in the air strikes without considering that it is a civilian area.”

Sharif Hassanyar, a former interpreter with U.S. Special Forces who is now working as a journalist, described how decisions were taken to bomb areas based on flimsy intelligence.

“I remember when I was working with a group of Rangers and a spy in the area told them the Taliban were training in a garden of a house so they bombed the house, without checking the information. Afterwards they found out that there had not been any Taliban there, only civilians were killed by the bombs,” he said.

Informants for the foreign forces often give bad information either accidentally or because they are pursuing tribal or personal vendettas against individuals in neighbouring villages, he added.

“The Taliban grow very strong in the aftermath of each attack,” said Hassanyar.

Mullah Zubiallah Akhond, a Taliban commander in Oruzgan province, says the attacks are sending recruits his way daily. “The people who are fighting with the Taliban are the brothers, uncles and relatives of those killed by the Americans. They have joined the Taliban and are fighting the Americans because they want to avenge their brothers, fathers or cousins,” he says.

“There are now Taliban in every village, many of them have rejoined the movement after the savage attacks carried out by the Americans.”

Popular struggle


He believes the attacks have helped turn their fight against the foreigners into a nationwide popular struggle.

“When an American vehicle is blown up every day on the main road in Wardak, the order is not coming from the Taliban leadership. It is the people themselves who have turned against the foreigners. They have come together in their villages and do not allow the foreigners to pass through their areas.”

It is not just the deaths from air strikes that are poisoning the hearts of Afghans. In the capital, Kabul, each day, terrified drivers swerve out of the way as foreign troops hurtle through the streets in their armoured convoys training their rifles on the drivers and pedestrians and shouting obscenities.The Afghans know to keep out of the way. Last year a U.S. military convoy ploughed into several vehicles, killing seven people including a family. The incident sparked a riot involving thousands of angry Kabul residents. It was suppressed only after the security forces started shooting protesters on the streets. At least 15 people were killed. “The anti-American feelings in Afghanistan are not just coming from conservative or religious elements,” said Shukria Barakzai, a female MP. “These feelings stem from the actions and military operations of the foreign troops. The anti-western sentiment is directly because of the military actions, the civilian casualties, and the lack of respect by foreign troops for Afghan culture.”

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New initiatives for labour

The world’s wage earners are in for hard times. With the developed world’s liquidity crisis triggering a global economic downturn, the first Global Wage Report by the International Labour Organisation has made a timely call for the reassertion of labour market institutions, minimum wages, and collective bargaining, in particular. Premonitions of a decline in jobs and a cutback on wages, as a consequence of the spreading economic contagion, have come true. Read along with the ILO’s recent projections of a rise in unemployment and an increase in the number of working poor (those with jobs but earning less than $2 a day), the report’s forecast of a decline in real wages in 2009 is the clearest early warning signal yet of hard times for workers, particularly low wage-earners. The unkindest cut is that these predictions are to overtake the world’s workforce when market forces are fast eclipsing the economic role of the state. Safeguarding wage earners is critical. Shrinking wages directly affect the world’s middle- and low-income classes, which account for 89 per cent of the world’s population (2002 data). The accompanying dip in consumer expenditure will drag economic growth and delay recovery from recession.
The Indian wage earners’ woes are exacerbated by several factors. First, the fragmented unionisation and the changing composition of trade union membership post-1991 provide minimal scope for collective bargaining. Secondly, the effete status of minimum wages, even in occupations where these are mandated, offers no meaningful economic sustenance or protection. As an initial step, the coverage of minimum wages should be widened to protect most vulnerable groups — urban non-formal workers, for instance. Keeping the system simple is equally important. A meaningful and universal minimum wage policy should precede any further initiative on labour reforms. Another imperative is to step up income support measures. One sector where these are required immediately is also one that is going through a major labour market transformation: the rural agrarian workforce, which suffers from lower job prospects. Seen along with the big-picture of a shrinking organised and public sector workforce there is an urgent need for a comprehensive labour protection policy. These call for a further strengthening, not weakening, of labour market institutions. The challenges are huge, but given the hardships that wage earners are likely to experience, governments in India and elsewhere should strengthen their protective role through new initiatives.

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A WARRIOR'S END

CHAIRMAN YASSER ARAFAT'S six decade long personal struggle for the emancipation of his people has come to an end. In contrast to other iconic figures who led their people against the forces of colonialism, the Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation was unable to secure freedom for his nation before he succumbed to an undiagnosed illness. However, Mr. Arafat's achievement was in some ways even more monumental given the conditions in which the Palestinians began their national liberation movement. They had barely begun to create a sense of oneness when they were struck in full force by Western imperialism and the Zionist enterprise. The powers that drew the political map of the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea refused to recognise even the existence of the people who had lived there for generations. For long these powers went along with the Zionist fiction that this territory was "a land without people" that should be given to "a people without a land." The Palestinians were given almost no succour and support when they were first driven out of 80 per cent of their homeland and very little effective help as they were subjected to colonial oppression in the strips of territory left in their possession. While the major powers in the so-called democratic world treated them with disdain, some of their Arab brethren were inclined to exploit rather than assist them. Mr. Arafat became the symbol of a scattered people because he, more than anyone else, preserved their national spirit and sustained their desire for liberty. In assessing the great warrior's achievements, there are those who say he missed a historic opportunity to secure his peoples' future when he refused to accept the deal Israel offered during the Camp David talks in 2000. This is a baseless assessment. The Palestinians, who were clinging on to the remnants of the patrimony left in their possession after the creation of Israel, were understandably reluctant to make further territorial and other compromises as they were asked to do at Camp David. The Zionist state was the real culprit behind the collapse of the Oslo processes because it refused to offer a settlement that Mr. Arafat could make his people accept. While Israel did make an improved offer at the follow-up negotiations held in Taba a few months later, it was by then too late for a settlement since the second intifada was under way. Mr. Arafat's critics are also in error when they blame him for the violence that has rocked the region for the past four years. It was the Israeli extremist, Ariel Sharon, who goaded the Palestinians into a violent uprising by arrogantly marching through the Holy Sites in Jerusalem. With Israel systematically destroying the administrative and security infrastructure the Palestinian Authority had established, Mr. Arafat was deprived of the means to stop the suicide bombers. The controversies arising out of the mismanagement of the Authority's finances are more troublesome. While no one has ever accused Mr. Arafat of misappropriating public funds for his personal use, he was unable to dispel the impression that this money was sometimes used arbitrarily to consolidate his political position.

In coming together to form a collective leadership, the different streams of the Palestinian national movement tendered the tribute that would have pleased their beloved Chairman most. This leadership is a manifestation of the spirit of national unity that Mr. Arafat created and sustained over decades. The smoothness with which the different factions overcame their differences shows that there was always an underlying willingness to work together. This owed in large measure to the governing style of a master tactician who took care to see that no faction was completely alienated. While Mr. Arafat never allowed anyone to challenge his pre-eminence in Palestinian politics and society, his people always found him approachable. The leader's life has come to an end but he has left a shining legacy for his followers to build upon

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Srilanka: Indian concerns

ON the morning of October 6, India’s National Security Adviser (NSA) M.K. Narayanan, in what is termed as “a departure from the norm” in diplomatic parlance, summoned the Sri Lankan Deputy High Commissioner to India to express “India’s grave concern and unhappiness” over the course of the ongoing military confrontation between the Sri Lanka security forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eeelam (LTTE). It is only natural that the action triggered questions as to what prompted the Indian government to engage its seniormost official tasked with national security to “summon” the number two in the mission of a neighbouring country, with whom India has a special and cordial relationship.A two-paragraph statement released by the Ministry of External Affairs on the meeting leaves little scope for doubt that it is the most forceful articulation by India on various aspects relating to the ongoing war and the ethnic conflict since open hostilities broke out between the Sri Lankan military and the LTTE in July 2006. The Sri Lankan Deputy High Commissioner was summoned by the NSA today to express India’s grave concern and unhappiness at the growing casualties of unarmed Tamil civilians as a result of military action. The escalation of hostilities in the North and the resultant fallout was leading to a great deal of concern in India. It was pointed out that there was need for the Sri Lankan government to act with greater restraint and address the growing feeling of insecurity among the minority community. To stem the deteriorating humanitarian situation, the need to revive the political process was highlighted. It was essential that vital supplies to the affected population were not disrupted in any manner. “Serious concern was also expressed at the continuing attacks on Indian fishermen, including the recent incident on September 27-28. This was not in keeping with the spirit of the understanding reached between India and Sri Lanka and recently reiterated in meetings held at the highest levels. The Sri Lankan Navy should cease such attacks and not lose sight of the humanitarian and livelihood dimensions of this issue.”

Lanka-watchers were not exactly surprised at the missive but were certainly left wondering about the concrete nature of India’s concerns and, most important, what exactly New Delhi had in mind when it talked about the need “to revive the political process”. The doubts lingered especially as the Mahinda Rajapaksa government has kept India in the loop on every single political and military initiative it has launched in the past two years. Such was the convergence in the thinking of Colombo and New Delhi that India was the only country to characterise the interim report of the All Party Representative Committee (APRC) in January as a “welcome first step”.

Further, there was no build-up in the two capitals that could explain the summoning of the diplomat. From the perspective of Sri Lanka, there was no major change in the ground situation in the conflict zone in the North where the LTTE continues to hold some territory against mounting odds. The displacement of 200,000-odd citizens trapped in the warn-torn territory is something that began on August 3 when the military crossed the border of Kilinochchi district. Incidentally, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was in Colombo on that day to attend the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation summit and made use of the opportunity for a detailed interaction with President Rajapaksa on the sidelines of the summit. The Indian side did not go public with any signs of alarm in the island nation.

Further, Manmohan Singh and Rajapaksa were in New York in the last week of September to participate in the United Nations General Assembly sessions. It is customary for the Prime Minister to meet important heads of state, particularly from neighbouring countries, on the sidelines of the General Assembly. Manmohan Singh and Rajapaksa were slated to meet, but presumably owing to scheduling problems the interaction did not take place. With the 123 nuclear deal with the United States hanging fire, the Indian establishment did not consider a meeting with Rajapaksa a top priority.

POLITICAL COMPULSIONS

So, what is the reason for the abrupt summoning of the Sri Lankan Deputy High Commissioner? To borrow a cliche from Sri Lanka Minister and Defence spokesperson Keheliya Rembukwella, in the perception of Colombo it could have been the result of “domestic political compulsions”. The Minister was responding to a question at the routine weekly briefing on a flurry of statements on the situation in the island nation emanating from the southern Indian State of Tamil Nadu. Going by press reports, political parties in the State are vying with one another to express concern over the plight of innocent Tamil citizens in the battle zones in Sri Lanka.The chorus on the humanitarian crisis rose suddenly when the Communist Party of India (CPI), the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and the Congress joined voices with the Marumalarchi Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (MDMK) and the Pattali Makkal Katchi (PMK). The political atmosphere in the State got surcharged when the CPI announced that the AIADMK would join the token strike it planned to express solidarity with the innocent citizens trapped in the war zone.

For reasons that are not clear, the AIADMK stayed out and announced its own programme. Later, the party’s general secretary Jayalalithaa made it clear that her party was concerned about the common people and not the LTTE. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi, who was the target of attack by rival political parties, was left with little choice on the subject. After a marathon session with his senior leaders on the morning of October 5, he issued a statement exhorting the people to send lakhs and lakhs of telegrams to the Prime Minister, asking him to “intervene immediately and stop the genocide of Tamils in Sri Lanka”.

Karunanidhi urged the Central government not to be deterred by the undesirable events of the past and instead take action to prevent racial killings. He told the Prime Minister to treat the statement as a matter of extreme urgency and act accordingly. The Prime Minister telephoned Karunanidhi on October 6 and discussed the issue. At a meeting in Chennai on the same day, Karunanidhi said, “We may have to consider the next step if the Central government fails to take immediate action. If it fails to find a solution to the problems of the Tamil people, we may be forced to consider whether this government is necessary.”

Clearly, it is pressure from various parties in Tamil Nadu that appears to have forced New Delhi to summon the Deputy High Commissioner. Political circles in Sri Lanka aver that India chose the NSA for the job as he represented the Prime Minister directly and thus wanted to convey a strong message.

However, contrary to expectations, the action of the Government of India did not trigger any panic in Sri Lanka. On October 7, Foreign Minister Rohitha Bogollagama made use of the opportunity provided by the assassination of a former Army General and United National Party (UNP) leader, Janaka Perera, by a suspected woman suicide cadre of the LTTE in Anuradhapura to issue a detailed response to the Indian move.

His message to India was polite but unambiguous: Please do not mistake the wood (Tigers) for the trees (Tamilians). “While our security forces are engaged in their present humanitarian operation to free our people from the fascist and dictatorial control of the LTTE terrorists, who are now confined to their last strongholds in parts of the Kilinochchi and Mullaitivu districts, critics of Sri Lanka and sympathisers of the LTTE are attempting to portray a misleading and totally false notion that the government is opting for a military solution to address the problems of the minorities. It is unfortunate that some of our friends too have been influenced by this malicious propaganda,” he told Parliament in a suo motu statement.

He further argued that the onus was on the international community to support Sri Lanka by taking concrete and tangible measures to combat terrorism. “Those who criticise the government for terminating the Cease Fire Agreement with the LTTE should be reminded that it was precisely the ending of this farcical and non-existent truce, in January this year, that ended the LTTE monopoly of Tamil politics and paved the way for the breakaway faction of the LTTE in the Eastern Province to transform itself into a recognised political party, the Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Puligal (TMVP), which contested two elections and won a popular mandate to govern the region.”

Referring to Narayanan’s expression of concern on the situation in Sri Lanka, the Minister reiterated the government’s policy of maintaining a close dialogue with India, with whom “we have a time-tested relationship based on mutual goodwill and trust”. The last paragraph was the clincher. “It is very important that all those who are concerned about Sri Lanka, including the welfare of the Tamil community, should perceive the marginalisation of the LTTE in the correct light. LTTE does not represent the Tamil community in Sri Lanka. Therefore, military action against the LTTE should never be perceived as action against our brethren, the Tamil community. We are concerned about them and will work with them to ensure their welfare, security and aspirations since they are our fellow citizens,” it read.

On the same day, President Rajapaksa met Indian High Commissioner Alok Prasad to discuss the Indian concerns and assured him of all possible measures to allay New Delhi’s apprehensions. He followed it up with a meeting of the APRC on October 11 in a bid to send out the message that the “political process” to find a solution to the ethnic conflict acceptable to all was very much alive. At the meeting, he reiterated the call to the LTTE to lay down arms, surrender and enter the political mainstream.

A statement by the Presidential Secretariat said that Rajapaksa summoned the APRC to apprise its members of the current developments on the “operations to eradicate terrorism, establish peace and restore democracy throughout the country”. In its interim report, the APRC had recommended steps for full implementation of the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, made in the aftermath of the India-Sri Lanka Accord of 1987, holding of elections to the Eastern Provincial Council and an interim political set-up in the North before the holding of elections to the Northern Provincial Council.

With the main opposition, the UNP and the Janatha Vimukthi Peramuna (JVP), staying out of the APRC, the body is reduced to a group of parties aligned with the ruling combine. The TMVP, led by rebel LTTE leader Vinayagamoorthi Muralidaran, widely known as “Col” Karuna or Karuna Amman, is the new entrant to the APRC. “However difficult it may be, it is my belief that the efforts to find political solutions to political issues should be continued. It is my belief that there are no military solutions to political questions. The people have elected us to realise their aims and aspirations. It is our duty to ensure to the Tamil people of the North the same democratic rights as enjoyed by the people in all other parts of the country. Military operations have become necessary to eradicate terrorism from the country and enthrone democracy throughout the land,” Rajapaksa told the members of the APRC.

Karuna Amman, who was inducted into Parliament recently, took part in the deliberations. The statement issued by the Secretariat quoted him as saying that he had been with the LTTE for more than 22 years and knew by experience that when the LTTE came forward seeking peace it was always to strengthen itself further. On earlier occasions, incumbent governments, possibly by mistake, had encouraged the LTTE by giving it arms and money.

“He recalled his own participation in several rounds of talks with the government held under international sponsorship. They had come to an understanding to accept a federal system as a solution. However, Anton Balasingham, without consulting [LTTE supremo] Prabakaran, had issued a statement stating that they were willing to consider a federal system. When he discussed this with Prabakaran, he rejected the idea of federalism. He wanted the talks dragged for at least five years till the LTTE obtained enough arms to strengthen itself further,” the statement said.It is indeed a delicate moment for India. With general elections a few months away and a growing clamour in Tamil Nadu for a more active role by New Delhi to alleviate the sufferings of innocent Tamil citizens, India has to do a balancing act. Colombo understands the Indian predicament and does not want to add to its discomfiture by any rash talk even though it is not in a position to satisfy fully the conflicting constituencies in Tamil Nadu.

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Mixed signals

THE immediate impact of the just-concluded Assembly elections in five States was felt in the Lok Sabha on December 10 when Parliament resumed after a gap of one and a half months. A number of United Progressive Alliance (UPA) members were seen virtually mobbing Sandeep Dikshit, Congress member from East Delhi constituency and the son of Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit. At the same time, Vijay Kumar Malhotra, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) member from South Delhi who was the party’s choice for the chief ministership in the Assembly elections, had a forlorn look as he sat in the front row of the Opposition benches.The Congress had got the better of the BJP three-two. The Congress retained Delhi and recaptured Rajasthan and Mizoram, while the BJP managed to hold on to Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. The result in Delhi brought unexpected cheer to the Congress and left the BJP shocked. Barely two days before the votes were counted, BJP general secretary Ravi Shankar Prasad told mediapersons confidently that the worst-possible result for the party from the Hindi heartland States – Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Delhi – would be 3-1. According to him, in the party’s consideration Mizoram was not a winnable State and the going was uphill in Rajasthan.

The unexpected loss in Delhi changed the entire complexion of the results for the BJP. The shock value of that defeat was amplified because the BJP leadership had time and again during the campaign described this round of elections as the semi-final leading to the final, that is, the Lok Sabha elections. The leadership had claimed that the BJP, in association with its partners in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), was sure to win the semi-final and the final. In the UPA, beyond the euphoric reactions, there is the realisation in significant sections of the Congress and its allies that the upper hand gained in the “semi-final” may not add up to much in the “final”. A senior Central Minister of the Congress from the South summed it up thus: “We are smiling now and that is the reflection of having lived to fight another day.” The leader said the three wins were indeed heartening as they came after a string of 11 Assembly-election defeats over the past three years but cautioned that the leadership and the rank-and-file should see it as a platform to regain lost ground and not as a signal of a real political comeback by the party and the UPA. A closer look at the results does emphasise the point that the 3-2 result does not signify a real political victory for the Congress. The Delhi victory was largely the product of the personal charisma of Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and the perception about the development work undertaken during her two stints in office.

In Rajasthan, the vote was essentially against the Vasundhara Raje-led BJP government and not a positive vote for the Congress. The return to power in Mizoram after a gap of 10 years also does not have a larger political import. The fact that the whole State of Mizoram constitutes a single Lok Sabha constituency underscores this.

According to the South Indian leader, it would be dangerous to read into these results anything more than what they actually are: the results of a few Assembly elections. “We need to keep in mind the BJP experience five years ago. It had won handsome victories in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan in 2003, but could not take these gains to other States in the Lok Sabha elections held a few months later, in 2004,” he said
He added that it would be wrong for the Congress to see these results as signalling the end of issues relating to internal security, price rise or inflation. “In actual terms, what it has provided the Congress and its partners in the UPA is some breathing space and room for manoeuvre before the campaign begins for the Lok Sabha polls,” he said.

This analysis, however, does hold a consolation for the Congress: its main rival, the NDA, did not gain politically. Throughout the run-up to the elections the BJP leadership was convinced that the national issues that the party raised – of internal security, price-rise and inflation – were the real issues in these elections. Leaders such as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Lal Krishna Advani, party president Rajnath Singh, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and strategist Arun Jaitley went at them hammer and tongs.

In fact, the BJP expected its rhetoric on internal security to have the maximum impact in Delhi. The huge turnout in Delhi on November 29, when the Mumbai terror attacks were brought to closure (Rajasthan went to the polls five days later) especially in the urban constituencies, was cited as proof of the success of the campaign. However, the results showed that the people came out in droves to endorse Sheila Dikshit and her record as Chief Minister.

Clearly, the BJP’s political agenda, which revolved around jingoist feelings over the threat of terrorism, internal security, Pakistan-whipping, and the not-so-camouflaged anti-minorityism, has been squarely rejected by the majority of the voters. In fact, BJP insiders admit that the party won Madhya Pradesh only because the low-profile Shivraj Singh Chauhan moved away from the “terror-focussed rhetoric” of star campaigners such as Modi and concentrated on core bijli-sadak-paani (electricity, roads, water) issues.

The results underscore the fact that the time has come for the BJP to get over its euphoric phase, which began when it retained Gujarat in early 2008. This euphoria was accentuated in May 2008 when the party made its foray into the south by capturing power in Karnataka. The jolts in Delhi and to some extent in Rajasthan should help bring the party to the ground.



COVER STORY

Mixed signals


VENKITESH RAMAKRISHNAN


The results of the Assembly round have infused some energy into the Congress and forced the BJP to take a realistic look at itself.





DIPTENDU DUTTA/AFP

Three wins after 11 defeats. Sonia Gandhi.

THE immediate impact of the just-concluded Assembly elections in five States was felt in the Lok Sabha on December 10 when Parliament resumed after a gap of one and a half months. A number of United Progressive Alliance (UPA) members were seen virtually mobbing Sandeep Dikshit, Congress member from East Delhi constituency and the son of Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit. At the same time, Vijay Kumar Malhotra, the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) member from South Delhi who was the party’s choice for the chief ministership in the Assembly elections, had a forlorn look as he sat in the front row of the Opposition benches.

The Congress had got the better of the BJP three-two. The Congress retained Delhi and recaptured Rajasthan and Mizoram, while the BJP managed to hold on to Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. The result in Delhi brought unexpected cheer to the Congress and left the BJP shocked. Barely two days before the votes were counted, BJP general secretary Ravi Shankar Prasad told mediapersons confidently that the worst-possible result for the party from the Hindi heartland States – Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Delhi – would be 3-1. According to him, in the party’s consideration Mizoram was not a winnable State and the going was uphill in Rajasthan.

The unexpected loss in Delhi changed the entire complexion of the results for the BJP. The shock value of that defeat was amplified because the BJP leadership had time and again during the campaign described this round of elections as the semi-final leading to the final, that is, the Lok Sabha elections. The leadership had claimed that the BJP, in association with its partners in the National Democratic Alliance (NDA), was sure to win the semi-final and the final.

In the UPA, beyond the euphoric reactions, there is the realisation in significant sections of the Congress and its allies that the upper hand gained in the “semi-final” may not add up to much in the “final”.

A senior Central Minister of the Congress from the South summed it up thus: “We are smiling now and that is the reflection of having lived to fight another day.” The leader said the three wins were indeed heartening as they came after a string of 11 Assembly-election defeats over the past three years but cautioned that the leadership and the rank-and-file should see it as a platform to regain lost ground and not as a signal of a real political comeback by the party and the UPA.

A closer look at the results does emphasise the point that the 3-2 result does not signify a real political victory for the Congress. The Delhi victory was largely the product of the personal charisma of Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and the perception about the development work undertaken during her two stints in office.

In Rajasthan, the vote was essentially against the Vasundhara Raje-led BJP government and not a positive vote for the Congress. The return to power in Mizoram after a gap of 10 years also does not have a larger political import. The fact that the whole State of Mizoram constitutes a single Lok Sabha constituency underscores this.

According to the South Indian leader, it would be dangerous to read into these results anything more than what they actually are: the results of a few Assembly elections. “We need to keep in mind the BJP experience five years ago. It had won handsome victories in Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan in 2003, but could not take these gains to other States in the Lok Sabha elections held a few months later, in 2004,” he said.


SUSHIL KUMAR VERMA

Agenda gone wrong. L.K. Advani.

He added that it would be wrong for the Congress to see these results as signalling the end of issues relating to internal security, price rise or inflation. “In actual terms, what it has provided the Congress and its partners in the UPA is some breathing space and room for manoeuvre before the campaign begins for the Lok Sabha polls,” he said.

This analysis, however, does hold a consolation for the Congress: its main rival, the NDA, did not gain politically. Throughout the run-up to the elections the BJP leadership was convinced that the national issues that the party raised – of internal security, price-rise and inflation – were the real issues in these elections. Leaders such as the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Lal Krishna Advani, party president Rajnath Singh, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and strategist Arun Jaitley went at them hammer and tongs.

In fact, the BJP expected its rhetoric on internal security to have the maximum impact in Delhi. The huge turnout in Delhi on November 29, when the Mumbai terror attacks were brought to closure (Rajasthan went to the polls five days later) especially in the urban constituencies, was cited as proof of the success of the campaign. However, the results showed that the people came out in droves to endorse Sheila Dikshit and her record as Chief Minister.Clearly, the BJP’s political agenda, which revolved around jingoist feelings over the threat of terrorism, internal security, Pakistan-whipping, and the not-so-camouflaged anti-minorityism, has been squarely rejected by the majority of the voters. In fact, BJP insiders admit that the party won Madhya Pradesh only because the low-profile Shivraj Singh Chauhan moved away from the “terror-focussed rhetoric” of star campaigners such as Modi and concentrated on core bijli-sadak-paani (electricity, roads, water) issues.

The results underscore the fact that the time has come for the BJP to get over its euphoric phase, which began when it retained Gujarat in early 2008. This euphoria was accentuated in May 2008 when the party made its foray into the south by capturing power in Karnataka. The jolts in Delhi and to some extent in Rajasthan should help bring the party to the ground.It is evident that the rejection of its internal security rhetoric has had a confusing effect on the party’s leadership. This was highlighted in the contrasting views that Rajnath Singh and Arun Jaitley expressed on December 8. Rajnath Singh said Shivraj Singh Chauhan and Raman Singh had ridden back to power on the “development agenda” and conceded that local issues rather than the campaign based on the “terror threat” decided the elections. Rajnath Singh further added that the Lok Sabha elections, too, could well be decided “primarily on local issues”.

Arun Jaitley, however, maintained that internal security and the terror threat continued to be major campaign issues for the party. Some close supporters of the BJP president told Frontline that Rajnath Singh’s comments on “the preponderance of local issues have to be seen in the context of the fact that the Mayawati-led Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) was instrumental in defeating the Congress in at least two dozen seats in Madhya Pradesh, thereby helping the BJP to retain power in the Hindi heartland. The BSP may not have fulfilled the expectations of forcing hung Assemblies in Madhya Pradesh and Delhi, but there is little doubt that the party registered its presence significantly in four of the five States – barring Mizoram – and caused considerable damage to the Congress.

The party opened its account in Delhi by winning two seats and improved its tally in Rajasthan (up to six from two last time) and Madhya Pradesh (up to eight from two) and maintained its tally of two seats in Chhattisgarh. Apart from these wins, the BSP polled over 10 per cent of the vote in 51 seats in Madhya Pradesh, in 38 seats each in Delhi and Rajasthan and in at least 11 seats in Chhattisgarh. Such incremental progress is ominous for the two mainstream parties. The BSP grew in exactly the same way in Uttar Pradesh and in the process reduced the two mainstream parties to political insignificance.

The rise of the BSP and the gains made by the Left parties in two crucial southern States through the formation of alliances with the Jayalalithaa-led All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) and the Chandrababu Naidu led-Telugu Desam Party (TDP) could well act as a fillip to a prospective ‘third formation’. The AIADMK and the TDP have chosen the Left parties as their allies in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh respectively despite the fact that they were former partners in the NDA. Their departure from the BJP fold is an indication that the BJP’s jingoist nationalism holds no appeal for a large number of regional parties.

Thus, in a broader sense, this round of Assembly elections has thrown up a new political context that can lead to a new balance of power. The political context is such that it has infused some energy into the Congress’ organisational system and forced the BJP to take a more realistic look at itself even as the BSP and the ‘third formation’ are poised to break new political ground. Obviously, it is a context pregnant with new and exciting possibilities

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Wisdom of restraint

THE Manmohan Singh government has done well to avoid a knee-jerk response to the Mumbai carnage and choose diplomatic means over military ones, in effect rejecting the hyperbolic proposition that the attacks were “India’s 9/11” or “an act of war”. This, coupled with the United States’ pressure on Pakistan to act against those involved in the attacks, has already resulted in the reported arrest of Laskhar-e-Taiba commander Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi and the house arrest of Jaish-e-Mohammed chief Maulana Masood Azhar.How far President Asif Ali Zardari’s government will go in acting against other LeT operatives remains unclear as does the Pakistan Army’s willingness to weaken the group’s military capability. But one can be cautiously optimistic.Eventually, the gains could be modest but will probably contrast favourably with India’s unproductive, expensive – costs estimated at Rs.7,000 to 10,000 crore – and high-risk response to the Parliament House attack of December 2001, which led to a 10-month-long eyeball-to-eyeball confrontation involving one million troops. This took the two countries to the brink of war at least twice, with the potential for escalation to the nuclear level.
No easy options
In the present case, India has no easy options. The task of pushing Pakistan to bring the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks to justice must be conducted with the utmost caution – without irreparably damaging the bilateral dialogue process or allowing a military build-up on the border or weakening Zardari’s civilian government. Equally, India must maintain a certain distance from the U.S. and not get drawn into its plans for Afghanistan and Pakistan. Consider the basic characteristics of the Mumbai attacks. In all likelihood, they were planned and executed by militants, identified by Indian police and intelligence agencies as belonging to the LeT, who received high-level combat and maritime training from professionals of the kind usually associated with Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency and former Army officers.Unlike in most cases in the past, there is compelling evidence in the present instance. This partly comes from the interrogation of the detained terrorist Mohammed Ajmal Amir Iman alias Kasab, whose arrest was itself a unique achievement. More important is the circumstantial evidence, including the attackers’ Global Positioning System and satellite telephone records, e-mail tracks, ordnance factory markings on arms, fingerprints on boats and other materials, and Pakistani labels on their rations and personal effects left behind on MV Kuber, which they apparently hijacked en route from Karachi. Much of this is admissible in law.The fact that the attackers carried out their assigned tasks with clockwork precision, targeted at least nine sites in Mumbai, and battled 500 commandos for 60 hours speaks of an extraordinarily high level of combat training and fanatical dedication. Indian intelligence and police agencies must painstakingly collect clinching, incontrovertible evidence and establish the attackers’ identities and their Pakistani connections before making any more public statements. They must carefully preserve and analyse all forensic evidence.

A strong caseThere have been lapses here, such as allowing the reopening of Leopold Cafe and the Trident. Too many premature statements have been issued. Even so, the existence of a strong prima facie case simply cannot be denied.

Although a high Indian official, who would only be identified as an “authoritative” source, told journalists in a background briefing on December 4 that the government had evidence of the ISI’s involvement, no specific disclosures have been made to substantiate this allegation. Nor has New Delhi gone public on this. Going by the available literature on terrorism, including publications by Pakistani analysts such as Ahmed Rashid, Shuja Nawaz, Ayesha Siddiqa and Hussain Haqqani, not many groups in Pakistan barring the LeT and Jaish-e-Mohammed have access to such a high level of military expertise through the ISI or possibly Al Qaeda. Past LeT-ISI connections are well documented although some analysts believe that the LeT has “outgrown ISI’s support”. But that some rogue ISI elements were involved cannot be excluded.

Officials and intelligence experts from the U.S. quoted in The New York Times say there is no hard evidence to link the ISI to the Mumbai attacks. “But the ISI has shared intelligence with Lashkar and provided protection for it.” Some others maintain that the collaboration “goes beyond information sharing to include some funding and training…. And these are not rogue ISI elements. What’s going on is done in a fairly disciplined way.” If the ISI is indeed involved, it would speak of a degree of complicity on the part of Pakistan Army officers. This is a hair-raising possibility, indicating loss of Army control over the agency and suggesting that the extremist rot has spread deeper and wider than anyone imagined.However, even if the ISI or its rogue elements are not directly involved, Pakistan has a responsibility to act against the terrorists who were based on its territory and were in all likelihood its citizens, according to Ajmal’s confession.

Easing pressure on Taliban
A good hypothesis about the attackers’ motives is that they wanted to provoke India into a military retaliation. This would furnish Pakistan with an excuse for redeploying the 100,000 Army troops currently stationed near the Afghanistan border, easing pressure on Taliban-Al-Qaeda militants and allowing them to regroup before Barack Obama assumes the U.S. presidency and drafts thousands of more troops into the Afghanistan war.

Pakistani ministers, including Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi, and military officials have already spoken of the need for such redeployment in case tensions mount with India. Taliban commanders operating near the Pakistan-Afghanistan border have said they are willing to offer a ceasefire and fight India jointly with the Pakistan Army.

Such redeployment would probably tilt the strategic balance in Afghanistan, leading to a possible paralysis of and even withdrawal by the U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) – and chaos in what has become the world’s most dangerous and volatile region, on a par with West Asia.

This spells horrifying consequences for the neighbourhood. India will not be immune from them. A triumphant Taliban and re-energised forces of jehadi extremism will not stop on the India-Pakistan border. Their impact will aggravate the Hindutva menace.

That is why India cannot afford to create conditions that will allow tensions and a military build-up on the Pakistan border, which can set in motion such a disastrous chain of events. A major, and possibly early, casualty in the chain will be Pakistan’s fledgling democracy and civilian government, which already faces an uphill task.

Pakistan’s internal crisis
Pakistan is in serious economic trouble, with inflation running at 25 per cent, its rupee in the doldrums, and a severe balance-of-payments crisis necessitating huge handouts. Worse, there is a growing collapse of governance and rising ethnic strife, manifested by the Mohajir-Pashtun clashes in Karachi, a creeping Taliban takeover of the North-Western Frontier Province, and an insurgency in Balochistan.

Virtually all institutions of governance have lost their integrity. The entire system may begin to unravel if a new military crisis breaks out.It is plain that India has no realistic military option unless it wants to catalyse or accelerate the disintegration of Pakistan. All the irresponsible talk about surgical strikes against LeT camps misses the simple fact that these are makeshift entities, where no personnel or equipment is stationed. True, the LeT has a 75-acre complex at Muridke near Lahore.

But for the most part, it houses madrassas, hospitals and skill-generation centres. It would be ludicrous to attack these – even assuming an attack would not be intercepted or invite massive retaliation.This, of course, does not mean that India should put all its eggs in the U.S. basket or rely on it to mediate its relations with Pakistan. This has always proved a high-risk gamble: the U.S. is guided by its short-term and parochial interests and plays one side off against the other, with unpleasant consequences for both.

Even less should India identify with and endorse the ISAF strategy in Afghanistan. It is therefore disturbing to note that the “authoritative” source referred to earlier characterised the U.S.-led war at the Afghanistan border as “also our war”.

India should chart out an independent course. After the five Assembly elections, which proved that the Bharatiya Janata Party’s hysterical anti-terrorism, attack-Pakistan plank has few takers, the government has greater freedom to fashion its own diplomatic strategy vis-a-vis Pakistan.The best strategy would be to take the Mumbai case to the United Nations Security Council under Resolution 1373, which requires all states to “refrain from providing … support… to entities or persons involved in terrorist acts…”, give “early warning to other states” and “deny safe haven to those who finance, plan, support, or commit terrorist acts…” all on pain of punitive measures. This multilateral approach will avert overbearing U.S. influence in South Asian affairs. Contrary to irrational fears, a 1373 reference will not revive the Kashmir issue or put India at a disadvantage in any other way. But adopting this course means thinking independently of the U.S. and asserting India’s policy autonomy. It is unclear whether our leaders are prepared to do this.

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India- China :Strategic differences

AS soon as the Simla conference began, Tibet claimed that it was an independent state, while China claimed that Tibet was one of its provinces. At the very second meeting of the conference on November 18, 1913, Sir Arthur Henry McMahon, who represented India in the talks, said, according to the minutes, that he did not see how the political status of Tibet could be discussed until the limits of the country were defined.

At the fourth meeting, on February 17, 1914, he tabled a statement on the limits of Tibetan territory. As a compromise, McMahon prepared a partition of Tibet: China to administer Inner Tibet, leaving Outer Tibet completely autonomous, albeit under Chinese suzerainty. The line between the zones was drawn in blue on a map appended to his statement. A red line showed Tibet “as a geographical and political unit”. This red line, insofar as it touched India and Burma, then a part of India, followed an alignment that had already been negotiated by Charles Bell with Lonchen Shatra but was subject to Lhasa’s approval. Lonchen Shatra represented Tibet in the Simla conference.On March 11, McMahon presented to the conference a draft convention, the text of which he had received from London. The draft mentioned clearly “the borders of Tibet and the boundary between Outer and Inner Tibet”. Both were traced on an attached map. By now Lonchen Shatra had received Lhasa’s approval to the border agreement he had reached with Bell. It was given formal shape in the form of an exchange of diplomatic notes between McMahon and the Lonchen on March 24-25, 1914, not at Simla but in Delhi where the conference was held from January to March, 1914.
The Lonchen’s reply of March 25 is reproduced in full: “As it was feared that there might be friction in future, unless the boundary between Tibet and India is clearly defined, I submitted the map, which you sent to me in February last, to the Tibetan government in Lhasa and I accordingly agreed to the boundary as marked in red in the two copies of the maps signed by you, subject to the conditions mentioned in your letter dated March 24, sent to me through Mr. Bell. I have signed and sealed the two copies of the maps. I have kept one copy here and return herewith the other. Sent on the 29th day of the 1st month of the Wood-Tiger year (March 25, 1914) by Lonchen Shatra, the Tibetan Plenipotentiary [Seal of Lonchen Shatra].”

The conditions were in respect of Tibetan ownership in private estates and the apportionment of two sacred places, Tso Karpo and Tsari Sarpa. Thus was the McMahon Line born. It was drawn on two map sheets in red ink at a scale of eight miles to an inch. They were attached to the two notes.Meanwhile, the tripartite conference was coming to a close. On April 27, 1914, at Simla, the representatives of all the three parties initialled the convention that McMahon had presented as well as the map appended. Ivan Chen, the Chinese plenipotentiary, wrote his name in full, though. Two days later, the Chinese government repudiated his action. Further negotiations followed but with no result.On July 3, 1914, having waited in vain for China’s adherence, India and Tibet signed a Declaration that China’s refusal to sign would debar it from the enjoyment of all privileges accruing from the April convention. They reiterated their own adherence to it. McMahon and the Lonchen initialled it again and affixed their seals ceremoniously. For good measure, both signed the map attached to it.Article 9 of the convention, which was initialled by Ivan Chen in April, spoke very distinctly of “the borders of Tibet and the boundary between Outer and Inner Tibet… in red and blue respectively on the map attached hereto”. The alignment of the red line, which delineated the Indo-Tibetan boundary, was identical to the alignment of the boundary as marked in red in the maps signed by McMahon and Lonchen Shatra in March 1914. Ivan Chen could not possibly have missed the significance of the red line on the map he had initialled.

As that authority, Dorothy Woodman, remarks: “It would seem extremely unlikely that Ivan Chen was unaware of the Indo-Tibetan talks and their outcome.” In any case, the language of Article 9 of the April 27, 1914, convention and the red line on the attached map served ample notice to China.

China’s objections

Every single Chinese document objecting to that convention confined the objections only to the border between Inner and Outer Tibet. Not once was the Indo-Tibetan border mentioned. This was true of Chinese objections before the convention was concluded on April 27, 1914, as well as those sent thereafter.

Here is a list of eight precise objections by China. None of them concerned the Indo-Tibetan border, the McMahon Line. All centred on the boundary between Inner and Outer Tibet, and on China’s relations with Tibet. “As far as available records show, Chen did not at any time complain of the bilateral agreement” between India and Tibet defining 850 miles of their border (Woodman, Himalayan Frontiers; 1969; page 181).

The list settles the issue.

1. On October 30, 1913, China presented its “counter-proposals”. Its seventh point read: “The frontier boundary between China Proper and Tibet is now roughly indicated in the accompanying map.” That line ran far to the north of Tawang (see map).

2. On April 3, 1914, China presented a five-point proposal (The McMahon Line and After, Parshotam Mehra; page 216; a masterly work). There was no reference to the border with India.

3. A telegram of April 20, 1914, from the Waichiapu (the Chinese Foreign Office) to Ivan Chen (intercepted by the British) mentioned seven points “on which we will never give in”. Again, the same omission of the external boundary. Its telegram of April 25 hinted that except for the internal boundary the rest was acceptable.

4. China’s Memorandum of April 25, 1914, handed to the British Ambassador also ignored Tibet’s (external) boundary with India.

5. The President of China sent a Secretary to meet the British Ambassador Sir John Jordan on May 1, 1914. He said after and a propos disavowal of Ivan Chen’s initialling that “the question of boundary was the only article not generally acceptable”.

The President objected to “the inclusion in Outer Tibet of Chiamdo and of complete portion of Kokonor territory”. A memo of May 11, 1914, proposed further negotiations.

6. A Memorandum of June 13, 1914, with a map annexed, centred again on the Inner-Outer Tibet boundary.

7. So did another of June 29, 1914. D.P. Choudhury points out that the line drawn in the map of June 13 “lay far away from the north-east frontier of India” (The North-East Frontier of India 1865-1914; page 157).

8. As late as on May 30, 1919, China continued to present its proposals. It said: “As regards the boundary, a brief outline of our proposal is as follows….” Four proposals were listed. All concerned the line dividing the partitioned Tibet.

So, far from accusing Britain of double-dealing, on June 30, 1914, well after the Simla Convention was signed, China begged Britain “to continue to act as mediator between China and Tibet”. On their part, both London and New Delhi were eager to retain China’s friendship and keep the door open for parleys. On March 8, 1920, Edwin Montagu, Secretary of State for India, rejected advice by the Foreign Office to publish the exchange of notes “so long as there remains any prospect of a final settlement of the Tibetan question by negotiations with the Chinese Government”. In 1928, when Aitchison’s Treaties was being revised, India Office decided that the documents be omitted.

Meanwhile, in Tawang, Tibetan administration continued as before in perfect bliss. The botanist W.F. Kingdom-Ward’s visit in 1935 sent the alarm bells ringing in South Block. “The main (Himalayan) range might be de jure frontier” but Tibet continued to administer the area, he reported. Nor was the Government of Assam better informed.

On February 6, 1936, it had to be informed that “the whole of the hill country up to the 1914 McMahon Line is within the frontier of India”. One Governor, Sir Robert Reid, who served from 1937 to 1942, used his spare time to write an authoritative History of the Frontier Areas Bordering on Assam 1883-1941.

This writer discovered in February 1970 that copies of the work were removed from the Governor’s Library. Governor B.K. Nehru confirmed this.

It was only in the 1930s that Chinese maps began showing the area south of the McMahon Line as Chinese territory. On August 17, 1936, New Delhi drew London’s attention to this. But Whitehall ruled that “unless” Nanking “should endeavour to assert their territorial claims on the Line” otherwise than on paper, “no protest was called for”. The silly expression “cartographic aggression” was coined two decades later.

Reid sent Captain G.S. Lightfoot to go up to Tawang in 1938. On his return, he recommended Tibet’s withdrawal from Tawang. Assam’s Acting Governor Henry Twynam had other ideas. In March 1939, he suggested a line along the Se La Pass. It would save money and earn Tibet’s goodwill. It would cost only “about one-fourth” of the McMahon Line.

It is unnecessary to consider here the attempts to make good the McMahon Line such as the missions by Captain G.S. Lightfoot (1938), J.P. Mills (1943) and J.P. Mainprice (1944). They are fully discussed in Woodman (pages 184-212) and Mehra (pages 413-437). The material that has come to light after the publication of these works puts the matter beyond doubt; namely, The Transfer of Power 1940-47 Volumes I to XII, published by the British government.

On December 18, 1945, the Viceroy, Lord Wavell, informed the Secretary of State, Lord Pethick-Lawrence, “to indicate our rights to the territory this side of the McMahon Line” (Volume VI, page 656; see also Volume VI, page 1,113; and Volume VII, page 34).

Wavell recorded on March 25, 1944, in his Journal, a conference with the Foreign Secretary, Sir Olaf Caroe, and Sir Basil Gould, Political Officer in Sikkim and for Bhutan and Tibet: “We discussed Gould’s visit to Tibet and possibility of stiffening up Tibetans to resist any Chinese encroachment, and also pushing up to McMahon Line on northern frontier of Assam” (The Viceroy’s Journal edited by Sir Penderel Moon; 1973; page 620; see also page 194 for a record of his visit in December 1945).

British policy was stated in a letter dated April 6, 1947, by L.A.C. Fry, Deputy Secretary, to A.J. Hopkinson, Political Officer in Sikkim. “The Government of India stand by the McMahon Line and will not tolerate incursion into India such as that which recently occurred in the Siang valley. They would however at all times be prepared to discuss in a friendly way with China and Tibet any rectification of the frontier that might be urged on reasonable grounds by any of the parties to the abortive Simla Conference of 1914” (The Transfer of Power 1940-47, Volume X, pages 156-7).

India’s policies on the McMahon Line were transparent. On March 4, 1948, Vallabhbhai Patel submitted to the President of the Constituent Assembly, as Chairman of its Advisory Committee on Minorities, Fundamental Rights, Tribal Areas, and so on, the Report of the North East Frontier Assam Tribal and Excluded Areas Sub-Committee which his Committee had adopted.

The Sub-Committee had undertaken extensive tours. It is a masterly document and bears quotation in extenso: “The facts are that in 1914 there was a tripartite convention with Tibet and China regarding the relations of the three governments and in particular regarding the frontier between India and Tibet. The convention which contained an agreement about the frontier line between India and Tibet was ratified by the Tibetan authorities at Lhasa, and the line known as the McMahon Line was indicated on a map of which a copy was given to the Lhasa government, which acknowledged it.

“The existence of this line was for a long time and known to the Assam government, and on the other hand it was found that there was no notification under Section 60 of the Government of India Act, 1919, specifying the northern frontier of Assam, with the result that the McMahon Line which is the frontier between Tibet and India is the legal boundary of Assam as well. In practice the position is peculiar.

“Though the Governor of Assam is vested with authority over the Frontier Tracts… it is taken to be exercised, not by virtue of the provisions applicable to Excluded Areas of the Government of India Act, 1935, but as the Agent of the Governor-General under Section 123 of the Act” (Constituent Assembly Debates; Volume VII, page 104).

On the partition of India, the Indo-Tibetan Notes of 1914 were listed among the treaties which devolved on India in an Order made under the Indian Independence Act, 1947. All these were public documents noted by Foreign Offices the world over.

Final push

Finally, on February 12, 1951, Major R. (Bob) Khating, a Tangkhul Naga and aide to the legendary Nari Rustomji, evicted the Tibetans from Tawang. China did not protest at all.

The Draft Constitution of India published on February 21, 1948, mentioned the area south of the McMahon Line in the Sixth Schedule, Part II. China did not protest. Nor did it protest when the Constitution of India came into force on January 26, 1950. Its Sixth Schedule had a table annexed. In part B para 1, the areas were precisely mentioned.Neither “regard for the historical facts”, nor pragmatism, nor commitment to a settlement can explain China’s persistent, obdurate, if not intransigent, stand on Tawang. It knows that India cannot cede that district, yet persists. One is at a loss to understand its calculations. Is it because it is not yet ready for a settlement? However, persist in the peace process both sides must.

A stage has been reached when it is futile to proceed with the Special Representatives’ charade. It has yielded nothing anyway. The dispute cries for attention from the top leaderships of India and China. They must come to grips with it and pursue the course with determination and in a spirit of conciliation.
Neither country is a threat to the other. Neither will play any outside power’s game. The peace dividend of a boundary agreement will be colossal and its effects far-reaching. Fundamentally, India must recognise China’s interests in the Aksai Chin and China must recognise India’s interests on the McMahon Line. That said, in both sectors some adjustments will be necessary. India cannot legally claim areas north of the McMahon Line which it unilaterally occupied. China must withdraw from the 2,500 square miles it occupied as a result of the 1962 war.

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