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Vedanta Resources Plc is a London Stock Exchange -listed diversified FTSE 100 metals and mining company. It is India’s largest non-ferrous metals and mining company based on revenues. With assets and operations in India, Zambia and Australia, it is primarily engaged in copper, zinc, aluminium and iron ore businesses. Recently, it has ventured into commercial power generation business. It is the first Indian manufacturing company to be listed on the London Stock Exchange. It is well on its way to become a million-tonne per annum producer at the lowest decile costs in aluminum, copper and zinc by 2010.
It has experienced significant growth in recent years through various expansion projects for copper, zinc and aluminium businesses and acquisition of Sesa Goa in April 2007, which enabled it to enter the iron ore business. Revenue from businesses increased from $3,701.8 million in fiscal 2006 to $7,930.5 million in fiscal 2010, representing a compound annual growth rate of 21%.
Vedanta has been criticised by human rights and activist groups, including Survival International and Amnesty International, due to their operations in Niyamgiri Hills in Orissa, India that are said to threaten the lives of the Dongria Kondh that populate this region. The Niyamgiri hills are also claimed to be an important wildlife habitat in Eastern Ghats of India as per a report by the Wildlife Institute of India as well as independent reports/studies carried out by civil society groups. In January 2009, thousands of locals formed a human chain around the hill in protest at the plans to start bauxite mining in the area.
Vedanta’s Alumina Refinery in Lanjigarh was criticised by the Orissa State Pollution Control Board (the statutory environmental regulation body) for air pollution and water pollution in the area. According to Amnesty International, local people reported dust from the plant settling on clothes, crops and food. An environmental impact assessment by the government found dust pollution was within acceptable limits. Vedanta officials claimed there was no dust pollution from the plant at all. An environmental inspection of the plant reported water pollution by the plant including increasing the pH value of the river Vamshadhara below the refinery and a high level of SPM in the stack emissions. In October 2009 it was reported that the British Government has criticised Vedanta for its treatment of the Dongria Kondh tribe in Orissa, India. The company refused to co-operate with the British Government and with an OECD investigation. They have rejected charges of environmental damage, saying it may be related to the increased use of fertiliser by farmers.
In 2007 unsafe mining operations led to 1,246 injuries and 26 deaths involving the group’s employees and contractors.
In respect of bauxite mines at Lanjigarh, Orissa, public interest litigations were filed in 2004 by Indian non-government organisations led by the Peoples Union for Civil Liberties to the Supreme Court sub-committee regarding the potential environmental impact of the mines. The Ministry of Environment and Forests received reports from expert organisations and has submitted its recommendations to the Supreme Court.
The sub-committee has found “blatant violations” of environmental regulations and grave concerns about the impact of the Niyamgiri mine on both the environment and the local tribal population. The committee recommended to the Court that mining in such an ecologically sensitive area should not be permitted.
Ministry’s negative response to Vedanta Project
After a long drawn-out consultation process, the Union government has finally pronounced its verdict against Vedanta Alumina’s $1.7-billion plan to mine bauxite in the Niyamgiri Hills of Orissa on 24th August 2010.
The Minister for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh said that there has been a very serious violation of the Environment Protection Act, the Forest Conservation Act and the Forest Rights Act. He blamed Vedanta, the Orissa Mining Corporation, and State officials for the violations. The clearance stands rejected.
Mr. Ramesh accepted the recommendation of the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) to withdraw the Stage I forest clearance, granted in 2008, and reject the Stage II clearance that the promoters had applied for. In the light of this, the environmental clearance will also become invalid. (See also Articles on ‘Environmental Issues’ in jeywin.com).
In a further blow to Vedanta’s plans in the region, the Ministry will investigate the allegation that bauxite for Vedanta’s Orissa refinery is being sourced from 14 Jharkhand mines, of which at least 11 do not have a valid environmental clearance.
The Ministry is also issuing a show-cause notice, threatening cancellation of the licence given to the refinery itself, which has illegally grabbed village forest lands and carrying out a six-fold expansion without permission. The appraisal process of the expansion has been suspended.
The FAC’s recommendation was based on the N.C. Saxena Committee report that detailed the violations and the adverse impact of the project on the local Dongria Kondh tribal community and biodiversity in the region. The Orissa Forest Secretary met Mr. Ramesh on 24th August 2010 to voice the State Government’s objections to the report. He also reiterated the argument put forth by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik that the Supreme Court’s August 2008 ruling in favour of an in-principle clearance made the final clearance a fait accompli.
He claims that his Ministry cannot function on the basis of fait accomplis. Since August 2008, a lot of new information has come to light. He says that it is on the basis of this incriminating new evidence that the decision has been taken.
Among the new information is the State government’s failure to implement the Forest Rights Act, which protects the community rights of forest-dwellers, especially tribals.
Instead, the Saxena Committee found that district administration officials deliberately submitted documents faking the consent of gram sabhas.
26 August 2010
After the bold action taken by the Union Environment and Forest Ministry against Vedanta’s plans to mine bauxite in Orissa, the clutch of bauxite and alumina projects in Visakhapatnam district in Andhra Pradesh may now feel the heat. Already, there is lurking fear in the bauxite mining and alumina refining industry that their projects could be next in the firing line by the Ministry as the issues were akin to those raised in the case of Vedanta. These include impact on indigenous tribal communities, ecologically sensitive region, rich flora and fauna and water sources, besides violations of Forest laws.
Union Mines Minister B. K. Handique, acting on a representation by Congress MP from Araku and chairman of Committee on Pubic Undertakings V. Kishore Chandra Deo, made it clear that the commencement of bauxite mining operations in Visakhapatnam will be kept on hold till issues raised by the latter were addressed.
The Environmental Impact Assessment report for Araku region would be re-evaluated.
The Minister made specific mention of the Jindal South West Holdings Limited, Ras-al Khaimah and three projects of National Aluminium Company Limited, all joint ventures with Andhra Pradesh Mineral Development Corporation (APMDC).
He informed the MP that a committee of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests will look into the issues regarding the impact of bauxite mining on water table, catchments, reservoirs, forest cover etc.
Reactions of the Tribals
The Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi has backed the tribals’ cause in Orissa’s Niyamgiri hills, which is the hotbed of the Vedanta controversy. Rahul’s visit comes two days after the Centre refused to give an environment clearance to Vedanta’s bauxite mining project. The Gandhi scion said development is important but it should be done after listening to the poor and the tribals.
He claims that does not mean curbing the poor, the tribals and the backward. Rahul said the tribals of Niyamgiri were being crushed. He reiterated the promise made in 2004 that the government of the poor and the common man would come at the Centre and they had shown that.
In March 2008, Rahul visited Lanjigarh and expressed his solidarity with the Dongriya Kondhs who have been opposing the Vedanta mines. He is back in 2010.
The timing of Rahul’s visit, just two days after Jairam Ramesh’s ban on Vedanta’s mining, has prompted the Orissa government to cry foul.
In the past 10 years, the tribal vote bank of the Congress has eroded in favour of the BJD. Many believe Rahul’s visit to Langigarh is to revive this tribal vote bank. The Congress, of course, denies the allegation.
As for the tribals of Lanjigarh, who have been opposing the mine for almost five years, the environment ministry’s order is a welcome reprieve. To counter Rahul’s tribal rally, the BJD is planning to organise a similar rally at the same place next week. It’s clear no political party wants to alienate the tribals in order to please Vedanta.
Vedanta has made it very clear that it has already invested $ 5.4 billion in the aluminum project in Orissa and there is no question of the company pulling out of the State.
But the big question is if Vedanta does not get its bauxite from the controversial Niyamgiri hills, will the Orissa government oblige to provide alternate source of bauxite to the company.
30th august 2010 – the current scenario
The government is planning to put in place a more transparent mining policy by designating parts of mineral-rich regions as out of bounds for industry because of environmental concerns, a move that can avoid episodes such as the recent ban on mining at Niyamgiri in Orissa but could hurt expansion plans of companies located in such areas.
The plan is to divide the country’s mineral-rich regions into so-called ‘go’ and ‘no-go’ areas, replicating a similar exercise carried out by the environment ministry for the coal sector. The exercise, spelt out by the ministry of mines in a note prepared a few days ago, is to identify areas where mining could be carried out without causing serious environmental damage. The nub of the exercise is to identify areas of dense forest cover where mining will not be allowed.
The note, which was prepared last week and has been seen by ET, will be reviewed by a group of ministers. The group, consisting of those with a stake in mining policy, includes BK Handique, the minister in charge of mining, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee, minister of state for coal SP Jaiswal, as well as minister of state for environment Jairam Ramesh, whose activism has provoked the policy review.
Once cleared by this group, the policy will be notified. The demarcation between mining and no-mining areas covers metallic minerals such as iron ore, bauxite and zinc, according to the note. Mr Handique could not be reached for comments.
While such proposals have been mooted earlier, efforts to bring in greater transparency into India’s notoriously opaque mining policy gained momentum after the environment ministry on August 24 denied permission to Orissa Mining Corp to mine bauxite on the Niyamgiri hills. The Niyamgiri bauxite was intended for Vedanta Aluminium, a joint venture partner of Orissa Mining Corp. However, the project faced stiff opposition from the local tribal population and from environmentalists who drummed up local and international support that resulted in the shelving of the project.
The proposal has the backing of the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), which has been taking an active interest in matters concerning mining and its impact on the environment. The PMO recently asked the group of ministers to prepare a national policy that will also spell out areas that can be allowed for mining.
The mapping exercise proposed by the mines ministry will use data collected by the Indian Bureau of Mines, a body controlled by the ministry which is involved in the development of mineral resources and in protecting the environment in mining areas.
The bureau is currently engaged in developing overlays or mining areas overlapping with thick forest cover. This could be used as the basic input for adopting the ‘go’ and ‘no-go’ concept. The mines ministry exercise will support the initiative proposed by the environment ministry to collate the density data of forest areas and put it on its website. This will enable organisations, including the Geological Survey of India, to prioritise areas for exploration for minerals.
For existing mining operations, the government official quoted earlier said, the categorisation will only have minimal impact though some portion of expansion of existing mining operations may get impacted.
A recent study by global research body BMO, that backs higher investment in mining-rich countries like India, says that among industrial commodities, copper, iron ore and metallurgical coal are the top picks because of expectations of strong demand in China.
Of the 89 minerals produced in the country, four are fuel minerals, 11 metallic, 52 non-metallic and 22 minor minerals. India is the largest producer of mica blocks and mica splitting; it ranks third in the production of coal and lignite, barytes and chromite. It is the fourth-largest producer of iron ore the sixth-largest of bauxite and manganese ore and the tenth-largest producer of aluminium.
Touted as Asia’s biggest Court Complex, the New Delhi’s sixth District Court came up in Saket and became operational from August 28, 2010.
Spread over 16 hectares, using a budget of Rs 313 crore,, the seven-story centrally air-conditioned Saket Court complex has 81 courts catering to the south and southeast districts of New Delhi, 700 lawyers’ chambers and 128 residential houses for judicial officers. Each floor is supported by a large central litigant waiting space with public amenities like toilets, drinking water and information display panels among others. Two bar rooms and a library for the judges and lawyers have also been provided. A temporary lock-up has been made for the undertrials till a permanent judicial lock-up is constructed.
Apart from having the best infrastructure in place, Saket court complex has also focused on security arrangements. Around 50 CCTV cameras have been placed in and out of the complex with a recording capacity of three days. The daily recordings will be monitored by the staff and all the entrances will be strictly monitored.
With its functioning, the litigants of south Delhi will not have to travel to the Patiala House Court complex to attend their cases. Earlier, 42 civil and criminal trial courts of New Delhi, south and south-east districts were located in the Patiala House courts. The Patiala House court complex houses a total of 5,000 lawyers and over 40 courts. At present, Patiala House Court has south district, south-east district and New Delhi district under its jurisdiction. As per the plans, only New Delhi district will stay in the Patiala House complex and other two districts will be transferred to Saket court.
From judges holding courts in the “space under the staircase” to “centrally airconditioned” courtrooms, the new swanky court complex at Saket is now a Model Court complex for other States. Sharing his experience of seeing judges working in “pathetic conditions” for the last 20 years, Chief Justice of India S H Kapadia on 28.08.2010 said that after opening of Saket court complex, which has the best infrastructural facilities, the subordinate courts will work with “dignity”.
“Can you have a judicial delivery system or justice delivery mechanism without proper infrastructure? The answer is no,” CJI Kapadia said at the inauguration of the sixth district court complex in New Delhil. CJI Kapadia said he had gone through the statistical data of the last 10 years regarding budget allocation for the judiciary and while other states had below 1% of their GDP being allocated to the judiciary, Delhi topped the chart with 1.6%. CJI Kapadia’s remarks were seconded by Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit also present at the inauguration who hinted that Saket was not going to be the last of the many district courts in the capital.” We are opening the sixth district court complex. Two more will come as and when the need arises. We can give whatever is required for the judicial system,” she said.
Khap Panchayats are self styled setups that have gained notoriety for resorting to honor killings of young couples or social boycott of their families for a simple reason that they chose to marry by choice. Right to freedom of life and liberty are the basic fundamental rights enshrined in our constitution. Rarely has anyone spoken against the Khaps in spite of their brutal misdeeds let alone anyone coming forward to register a case against them. The Court must set a precedent and uphold the prosecutions plea by ordering death sentence to guilty members of the Khap, which run as parallel Kangaroo Courts in our country.
Khap Panchayats in India
Khap is a cluster of villages united by caste and geography. It is as old as 14th century started by upper caste jats to consolidate their power and position. The main rule is that all boys and girls within a khap are considered siblings.
Khap Panchayat governs the khap formed by same gotra (clan) families from several neighbouring villages. Khap panchayats are prevalent in Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh and Parts of Rajasthan. Love marriages are considered taboo in areas governed by Khap panchayats. Those living in a Khap are not allowed to marry in the same gotra or even in any gotra from the same village. Many young couples have been killed in the past defying khap rules.
Khap Panchayat imposes its writ through social boycotts and fines and in most cases end up either killing or forcing the victims to commit suicide. All this is done in the name of brotherhood and its honour. It is due to the inherent weakness of democratically elected Panchayati Raj institutions, Khap panchayats have been powerful.
The 10-15 men who constitute a Khap settle disputes and control the lives of young people. Many village people also defend these caste panchayats as they deliver the verdict in one sitting whereas court cases drag for years. According to them, in many cases innocent people get harassed in the court and by police. Here as everyone is known so they cross check everything to ensure neutrality.
In some Haryana villages, the young girls are routinely threatened, abused and killed all under Khap verdicts. It is acceptable for the families to feed pesticide pills to the teenage girls and then dispose off their bodies by burning them without any police records. The entire onus of siblinghood rests on the girl. She is the keeper of village honor. Sometimes rules are bend for the boys but a girl is never allowed to bend the rules. If couples run away then, the families risk the boycott and hefty fines in lakhs of rupees. Even the other women of the house can suffer abuse.
In keeping with the khap rules, older villages try to keep the young people apart. Some schools are also forced to have separate timings for the boys and girls. Fearing their daughters would go astray, many parents marry them off at an early age. People have unquestionable faith in the justice of khap. The question of rights for women does not exist any where in the territories ruled by Khap panchayats.
Horror killings ordered by Khap Courts
Recently, Honour Killing also reported from the Shivaganga district of South Indian state Tamil Nadu. The horrific cycle of honor killings to protect the honour of a family or a caste has now spread its tentacles to entire India.
In Shivganga, 20 year-old Megala and 24-year-old Sivakumar, were told that they could not marry as they were related. Despite Megala’s love, her family married her off in June. She eloped with Sivakumar ten days after the wedding. Her family traced the couple and killed Sivakumar with sickles.
The killers included Megala’s father and brother. Megala says that everyone in her village, including her mother, justified the killing of her lover as she fetched shame to her community and village.
For the cause of loving a person in the same caste, the cultureless caste fanatics, in the name of honour, subjected the girl Monica (18) and her lover Rinku to brutal inhuman laws as both belonged to same Jat community of Haryana’s Nimriwali village.
The father of Monica, her brother, uncle and cousins are suspected to be behind the crime and are absconding. They had done this under the guidance and protection of Khap Panchayats, the apex body of caste based council.
The main function of Khap Panchayat is murdering couples of the same gotra or sub caste in the villages of rural India.
The murder of Monica and Rinku forced the Supreme Court of India to interfere in the issue. On June 21, 2010, the Supreme Court issued notices to the Centre, Haryana government and six other states to take action against the killing of young couples.
Nirupama, a 22-year-old journalist was found murdered at her home in Jharkand. Nirupama, hails from a Brahmin family, was in love with a boy from another caste.
In May 2009, a Court in Haryana awarded capital punishment to five persons and life sentence to one for murdering a couple for marrying against the societal norms. After the verdict, the Khap Panchayat openly challenged it. They collected money to file appeal against the court verdict and demanded change in the constitution of India.
Government plans to tighten noose on Khap Panchayats
In a bid to stop the murder of young couples and their family members in the name of tradition and honour, especially under the instruction of Khap panchayats in North India, the Union home ministry has come up with a stringent law.
The proposed law will make all Khap members accomplice in the crime, besides bringing all such cases under the purview of murder (section 300 of the Indian Penal Code).
The ministry has circulated the draft of the ‘Indian Penal Code and Certain Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2010’, to bring changes in the IPC, Indian Evidence Act, 1872, and the Special Marriage Act, 1954, and put a leash on the spate of honour killings in recent times.
The Supreme Court had issued notices to the Centre and the Haryana, UP, Punjab, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Bihar, Himachal Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh governments seeking information on steps taken to stop honour killings.
The home ministry wants such killings to be brought under the purview of murder and have in place a proper definition of dishonour or perceived dishonour. The new IPC provision will make Khap members accomplice in the crime and prosecute leading members of caste panchayats.
During the trial, the burden of proof will be on the accused instead of the victims. For this, a new section — 105A — will be inserted in the Indian Evidence Act.
Besides, to ensure the safety of couples marrying against the wishes of families, communities and caste panchayats, the government proposes to do away with the present compulsory 30-day notice period in the courts under section 5 of the Special Marriage Act.
This means a couple will be able to tie the knot in courts immediately after giving an application for marriage.
It was felt that the present notice period, during which the photographs of the couples were pasted on the notice board of the court, was leading to easy identification of the couples. They were being harassed and even killed by the families later.
As for the IPC amendment, the ministry feels that since caste panchayats are informal bodies with no legal status, the members of caste and clan have to be treated as accomplices in the crime. The new law will view all members of the caste panchayat ordering the killing deemed guilty by virtue of their association with such a body, whether or not they supported the act.
In the new law, “dishonour” has been explained as acts such as adopting a dress code unacceptable to family, caste, clan, community or caste panchayat; choosing to marry within or outside gotra, caste, clan, community and engaging in sexual relations unacceptable to family, caste, clan, community or caste panchayat.
The National Commission for Women has sought severe punishment for people who give provocative statements favouring such killings.
The proposed amendments IPC section 300: Inserting a new (fifth) clause indicating that culpable homicide is murder if the act by which death is caused is done with the intention of causing death or if it is done by any person or persons acting in concert with, or at the behest of a member of a family or a member of a body or group of caste or clan/community/caste panchayat (by whatever name called) in the belief that the victim has brought dishonour upon the family/caste/clan/community or caste panchayat.
Indian Evidence Act: A new section 105A will be inserted, which says when death of a member of a family occurs and a person or a group of persons is accused of acts falling within the fifth clause of section 300 of the IPC, then, the burden of proving that the case does not fall within that section shall be upon such person or persons.
Special Marriage Act: In the Section 5, the words notice “for a period of not less than 30 days” shall be omitted.
Khap Panchayats seek legal claws
Irked at being equated with the Taliban and kangaroo courts, khap panchayats in Haryana are now determined to get some legal sanction. Soon, they will draw up a set of recommendations for making “suitable” amendments to the Hindu Marriage Act (1955) at the state level so that their rulings become valid under law.
At a two-day meeting in Rohtak, the Sarv Khap Panchayat, a conglomerate of various khaps, decided to set up a core committee to suggest amendments to the Act to disallow same-gotra and same-village marriages as per Jat tradition.
Lt Col (retd) Chander Singh Dalal, an advocate in Rohtak who organized the “seminar”, said: “After elections, I plan to send the draft recommendations to each of the 90 MLAs and persuade them to bring a Bill in the assembly. I am sure it won’t be opposed. Once the amendments are brought in, there’ll be no place for dispute.”
Justice (retd) Devi Singh Teotia, a former judge of the Punjab & Haryana HC, who actively participated in the Sarv Khap Panchayat, said: ”Khap leaders are keepers of Jat tradition and they have lately been facing flak for it. If the amendments come through, there will be no more clashes between tradition and the law, and they (the khap leaders) won’t be maligned.”
He said the amendments will be sought at the state level, so that they apply to any marriage taking place in Haryana. ”One of the sections of the Hindu Marriage Act says that you can’t marry your brother or sister, unless custom permits. This exception clause was added for some south Indian customs where sibling marriages are allowed under extreme circumstances. “Since Jat custom doesn’t permit marriage within the same gotra and in the gotra of one’s parents, we can seek a similar clause.
Similarly, certain other sections need small alterations,” he said. The meeting, attended by more than 150 khap leaders besides intellectuals, doctors and social activists from the community, also debated ways to improve the khaps’ image in the media. Teotia said he suggested that a handful of educated people from the community should be nominated to assist khap leaders in taking decisions and help them in media management.
Divorce granted by Khap Panchayats not valid: SC – 26.08.2010
Divorce between estranged couple approved by Khap Panchayats (caste council) will have no legal sanctity, the Supreme Court has ruled on 26.08.2010.
A Bench of Justices P Sathasivam and B S Chauhan upheld an Allahabad High Court judgement that had quashed a Varanasi Family Court’s ruling that divorce between Mahendra Nath Yadav and Sheela Devi had become effective since it had been approved by the khap panchayat.
“The High Court has rightly held that dissolution of marriage through Panchayat as per custom prevailing in that area and in that community cannot be a ground for granting divorce under Section 13 (desertion or cruelty) of the Act, 1955.
In a significant move, the Government of India has agreed to a proposal to introduce Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) in place of Civil Services (Preliminary) Examination.
“The government has approved the proposal for the introduction of Civil Services Aptitude Test (CSAT) in place of Civil Services (Preliminary) Examination,” Minister of State for Personnel, Public Grievances and Pensions Prithviraj Chavan informed the Rajya Sabha, on 26.08.2010.
In CSAT, one of the optional subjects which a candidate could have chosen out of 23 optionals has been replaced with a common paper on aptitude test, he said, adding the syllabus of CSAT is being worked out.
The government will shortly notify the new scheme of examination giving details of the syllabus, the Minister said in a written reply in Rajya Sabha on 26.08.2010.
A cloned buffalo calf was born at the Karnal-based National Dairy Research Institute (NDRI) on 22.08.2010, where two calves were cloned a year ago, the Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR) announced here on 23.08.2010.
The buffalo calf, named Garima-II, was born through the new and advanced ‘hand-guided cloning technique’. It weighs 32 kg and is apparently normal and healthy. “This cloned buffalo calf is different from the earlier clone calf because, in this case, the used donor cell was an embryonic cell,” said NDRI Director A.K. Srivastava in a press statement.
Faster multiplication
According to him, the technology could go a long way in facilitating faster multiplication of superior milch buffaloes in the country. “There is an acute shortage of good bulls in the country. The technology of cloning will decrease the gap between supply and demand by breeding the bulls in the shortest possible time,” he said.
Dr. Srivastava said that although the world’s largest population of buffaloes was in India, and it contributed about 55 per cent to the total milk production in the country, the percentage of elite buffaloes was low.
Dr. Srivastava and his team of scientists, including M.S. Chauhan, S.K. Singla, R.S. Manik, Shiv Prasad and Aman George, feel that embryonic stem cells have a better cloning ability as compared to somatic cells (used in earlier cloning) that are lineage committed.
The world’s first buffalo calf through the ‘hand-guided cloning technique’ developed by the NDRI was born on February 6, 2010 but it could not survive beyond five days. The second cloned calf, Garima-I, was born on June 6, 2009. It survived and is reportedly healthy.
The new calf was developed from embryos that were cultured and grown in a laboratory and then transferred to recipient buffalo. It was born in a Caesarean operation carried out by a team of doctors from the NDRI and Chaudhary Charan Singh Agricultural University, Hisar.
New era
Congratulating the team, ICAR Director-General S. Ayyappan said the new technology of hand-guided cloning of buffaloes may lead to a “new era in faster multiplication of elite germplasm to face the challenges of increasing demands of milk in view of the ever-growing human population”.
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Marriage is a celebration in India, but unfortunately so is child marriage. Although we have a statute since 1929 to restrain the same, the power of that legislation in controlling this social evil is dismal. Interestingly, in the era of Chandrayan, we repeatedly hear cases of Child Marriages. Child marriage is a stigma on the forehead of our society. In a recent case, a widow and mother of six children married her 12-year-old daughter to a 35-year-old man in Channa Bakhar village of Jodhpur
The marriage took place clandestinely in the village in the presence of a few relatives and was kept hidden from other villagers. But when the news leaked, the village Panchayat and Sen Samaj declared the marriage illegal. The villagers worked together to save the girl. The Balika Vadhu has purportedly gone into hiding even as her husband Gajendra Sen and his parents were running away.
Child-marriage originated in the medieval age and was born from the same compulsions that perpetuated Sati. It was not prevalent in ancient India. The most popular form of marriage was Swayamvara where grooms assembled at the bride’s house and the bride selected her spouse. Svayam-vara can be translated as self selection of one’s husband, Svayam = self, Vara = husband. Instances of Swayamvara ceremony are found in our national epics, the Ramayana and Mahabharata. Various types of marriages were prevalent in ancient India Gandharva Vivaha (love marriage), Asura Viviha (marriage by abduction) etc., But among these Bal-Viviha (Child marriage) is conspicuous in its absence.
Origin and Causes of child marriages
In the medieval ages, law and order was not yet a universal phenomenon and arbitrary powers were concentrated in the hands of a hierarchy led by a despotic monarch. In India the Sultans of Delhi who held the place of the despotic monarch, came from a different type of culture. Orthodox in their beliefs with a fanatical commitment to their religion there was a ruthless method in its propagation. Intolerant as they were to all forms of worship other than their own, they also exercised contempt for members of other faiths.
As usual, women were the victims during any war, arson, plunder, etc. During the reign of the Delhi Sultans, these were the order of the day and the worst sufferers were Hindu women. During these dark days were spawned customs like child-marriage and selection of women from the rest of the society, wearing of the Ghungat (veil). This age also perpetuated customs like Sati and looking upon the birth of a female baby as an ill omen, even killing newly born baby girls by drowning them in a tub of milk. Amidst the feeling of insecurity, the presence of young unmarried girls was a potential invitation for disaster.
The predatory Sarasenic feudal lords and princes of Sarasenic origins who stalked all over India in the middle ages were a source of constant threat. A girl at home was an invitation for disaster. As such, parents would seek to get over with the responsibilities of their daughters by getting the custom of child marriages with the ‘bride’ and ‘groom’ still in their cradles was a culmination of this tendency. This way the danger to a growing girl’s modesty was somewhat reduced.
Along with this principal reason, there were a few other reasons arising from the nature of the feudal society which were conducive for the prevalence of this practice. In a feudal society, qualities like rivalry, personal honour, hereditary friendship or enmity are rated very highly. Because of this, military alliances play a very important role in preserving or destroying the balance of power between the various kingdoms and fiefdoms. To ensure that the military alliances entered into were observed by both parties, practices like exchanging juvenile members of the respective families who were educated and brought up at each other’s palaces were followed.
They were considered to be captives who were held to ensure that the military alliances between the two kingdoms or clans were honoured. But, a more lasting bond that could back up military alliances was matrimonial alliances between members of the two families. But such matrimonial alliances could be worked out smoothly only if the bride and groom were ready to accept each other. Young men and women of marriageable age are bound to be choosy. This difficulty could be avoided when the marriage was between two children or babies where there was no question of their having any sense of choice as to who their partners in life should be.
The caste hierarchy also perhaps had its role to play in perpetuating such a system. Caste which is based on birth and heredity does not allow marriages between members of different castes. But as youngsters whose emotions and passions could be ruled by other considerations might violate this injunction. Out of the necessity to preserve itself, the hereditary caste system could have helped in nourishing the practice of child-marriage.
Among other subsidiary considerations which could have helped to preserve this custom might be the belief that adults (or adolescent) boys and girls would indulge in unhealthy moral practices. This consideration would have been more relevant in the context of the puritanical and orthodox environment of the bygone ages. The practice could also have been perpetuated, especially among- the economically weaker sections, by the consideration of keeping marriage expenses to a minimum. A child-marriage need not have been as grand an affair as adult marriages.
The Current Scenario
The legal age for marriage in India is 18 years for a female and 21 for a male as per Section 6 of the Hindu Marriages Act, 1956. Any marriage of a person younger than this is banned and punishable in India under the Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006.
But child marriages still take place in India, particularly around the Hindu holy day of Akshya Tritiya. Normally Hindus decide the date for marriages based on horoscopes interpreted by pundits. Some dates however are considered so auspicious that no pundit needs to be consulted. One such day is Akshya Tritiya (also knows as Akha Teej), the third day of Baishakh, the month of the Hindu calendar generally falling in May. During this time lots of marriages take place. Unfortunately, many of them are child marriages. It is a religious tradition in many places in India and therefore quite difficult to change.
And that is really the crux of the problem — child marriages are a reflection that, like sati, women and girls are seen as property that ‘belongs’ to someone: her family, her husband, her in-laws. If her marriage is left too late, she is considered a burden to her own family. In some communities where child marriage takes place, instead of dowry there is a system of ‘bride price’ where, when the girl gets married, the husband’s family has to pay a sum of money in exchange for the bride. Instead of making things better, this system also means that families are eager to get their daughters married off so they can bring in money.
In any case, child marriages are worse for girls than for boys, since the girls are usually younger than the boys. Marriage also puts an end to any education girls may have been receiving. And if they get pregnant while still young, their health gets much worse since their bodies are often not ready to bear children. According to the United Nations, maternal mortality i(which indicates the number of women dying in childbirth or from pregnancy-related causes) is 25 times higher for girls under 15, and two times higher for 15-19-year-olds.
Interestingly enough, around the same time as Akshya Tritiya in 2010, the United Nations had just concluded a special session on children where they adopted 21 child welfare goals for the next decade. One of these was to end “harmful traditional or customary practices such as early and forced marriage”.
Consequences of Child Marriage
All children have a right to care and protection; to develop and grow into a complete and full individual, regardless of their social and economic situation. Child marriage is a blatant violation of all these rights.
Child marriage denies children their basic rights to good health, nutrition, education, and freedom from violence, abuse and exploitation.
When the persons in the marriage are children, their body and mind are put to grave and heinous danger. Most often the child is not even aware of what really awaits her/him as a consequence. Marriage by its very institution imposes certain social responsibilities on the persons in it. It also provides the legal sanction for engaging in sexual activity and procreation. This amounts to sanction for child sexual abuse and rape.
For girls early marriage is the beginning of frequent and unprotected them to early motherhood, reproductive tract infections and sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV/AIDS. It also means frequent pregnancies and abortions.
Early marriage resulting in early motherhood means placing both the young mother and her baby at risk. It leads to increase in the rate of infant mortality and maternal mortality and birth of babies who have low birth weight, malnutrition and anaemia.
Early child marriage violates the child’s right to education. Children remain illiterate and unskilled, which in turn limits their opportunities for economic employment and economic independence as an adult.
Child brides often experience a sudden decline in their social networks, leaving them with few friends and peers if any. Such social isolation pose a host of other challenges that limit their ability to promote their health, development and well-being.
Parents justify early marriage as a way to protect the girl child from violence. However, parents do not understand that child marriage actually opens the door to an endless and vicious cycle of domestic violence and abuse. Marriage is also often used as the first step to trafficking for commercial sexual exploitation, forced labour or any other purpose.
Preference for sons leads to female foeticide adding to the woes of the girl child. It results in fall in the number of girls available for marriage and hence buying of young brides, particularly in states with a skewed sex ratio. Some girl children are victims of “fake marriages” after which they are trafficked for sexual exploitation or as labour. Reports from Haryana, Punjab, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan bear testimony to this.
The Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006
The basic premise of the law is:
To make a child go through a marriage is an offence.
Child or minor is a person up to 18 years in the case of girls and 21 years in the case of boys.
Voidability of Marriage at the Option of Child
Unlike the earlier legislation, wherein there was no provision for the voidability of the marriage, the new legislation makes the child marriage voidable at the option of contracting party who was a child at the time of marriage i.e. the child who has been married off has the option to go to the court of appropriate jurisdiction (district court or family court, as the case may be) and get his/her marriage declared cancelled. Further, there were only punishments prescribed for individuals getting into child marriage i.e. for the male adult, for the guardians who solemnized the marriage and for individuals who conduct or perform the marriage in any manner. However, the punishment was a meager simple imprisonment upto three months and fine.
However, under the new Act, the child can get the marriage cancelled if he/she so desires. If she does not exercise this option then the marriage remains valid. At the same time, if one spouse is not a child, he cannot get his marriage cancelled and he has to fulfill all the marital obligations of a husband like sustaining the wife, maintenance etc.
This option can be exercised by the child who has been married off and not by anybody else. If the child is still a minor at the time of filing the petition, the guardian can file the petition along with the Child Marriage Prohibition officer for him.
Further, a limitation period of two years from the date of attaining majority has been imposed.
While granting a decree of nullity under this section, the district court shall make an order directing both the parties to the marriage and their parents or their guardians to return to the other party, his or her parents or guardian, as the case may be, the money, valuables, ornaments and other gifts received on the occasion of the marriage by them from the other side, or an amount equal to the value of such valuables, ornaments, other gifts and money. Further, no order for nullity shall be passed unless the concerned parties have been given notices to appear before the district court and show cause why such order should not be passed.
Maintenance and Residence for the Female Child
Section 4 of the Act makes a provision for maintenance and residence to female contracting party to child marriage. If the child marriage is cancelled or nullified, then the district court may also make an interim or final order directing the male contracting party to the child marriage, and in case the male contracting party to such marriage is a minor, his parent or guardian to pay maintenance to the female contracting party to the marriage until her remarriage.
Looking at the social conditions in India, it can be imagined that it would be difficult for the girl to find a good residential place for herself. Therefore, the law along with making provision for maintenance also gives the power to court to make a suitable order as to her residence.
Children of Child Marriage – Their Custody, Legitimacy and Maintenance
The law also makes provision for custody and maintenance of children of child marriages. It gives the discretion to make a suitable order for the custody of such children. Undoubtedly, while making an order for the custody of a child under this section, the welfare and best interests of the child shall be the paramount consideration to be given by the district court.
An order for custody of a child may also include appropriate directions for giving to the other party access to the child in such a manner as may best serve the interests of the child, and such other orders as the district court may, in the interest of the child, deem proper. The district court may also make an appropriate order for providing maintenance to the child by a party to the marriage or their parents or guardians.
To dive further into the problems and consequences of child marriage, another issue that could arise, would be the legitimacy of the children born under a child marriage where such marriage has been declared to be null.
Punishments
Originally, Child Marriage was dealt with by the Child Marriage Restraint Act, 1929 (Act 19 of 1929). In 2006, it was repealed and replaced by The Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006. It contains 21 Sections.
Sections 9, 10, 11 and 13 of The Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 2006 deal with punishments for various contraventions.
Section 9: The punishments for a male adult marrying a child shall be rigorous imprisonment upto two years or fine upto one lakh rupees or both.
Section 10: The punishment for solemnising a child marriage in the form of performing the child marriage or abetting in any form shall be punishable with rigorous imprisonment which may extend to two years and shall be liable to fine which may extend to one lakh rupees unless he proves that he had reasons to believe that the marriage was not a child marriage.
Section 11: The law makes provision for the punishment of any person having charge of the child, whether as parent or guardian or any other person or in any other capacity, lawful or unlawful, including any member of an organization or association of persons who does any act to promote the marriage or permits it to be solemnised, or negligently fails to prevent it from being solemnised, including attending or participating in a child marriage. The quantum of punishment has been laid down as rigorous imprisonment which may extend to two years and shall also be liable to fine which may extend up to one lakh rupees. The Act makes an exception in case of women and provides that no woman shall be punishable with imprisonment.
Section 13: Prescribes punishment for performing child marriage by disobeying the injunction granted by any competent Court and the punishment is imprisonment of either description which may extend to two years or with fine which may extend up to one lakh rupees or with both.
Further, the action also makes a presumption against the accused (which is again a deference from the normal law that the accused is always presumed innocent till proven guilty). It is presumed, unless and until the contrary is proved, that where a minor child has contracted a marriage, the person having charge of such minor child has negligently failed to prevent the marriage from being solemnised.
Marriages to be void in certain cases
The law further lays down the few cases in which the marriage of a minor child is to be void, i.e. where the child,
is taken or enticed out of the keeping of the lawful guardian; or
by force compelled, or by any deceitful means induced to go from any place; or
is sold for the purpose of marriage; and made to go through a form of marriage or if the minor is married after which the minor is sold or trafficked or used for immoral purposes,
such marriage shall be null and void.
A complaint regarding a possible child marriage may be made by any person having personal knowledge or reason to believe, and a non-governmental organisation having reasonable information, relating to the likelihood of taking place of solemnisation of a child marriage or child marriages.
It is also provided that the Court of the Judicial Magistrate of the first class or the Metropolitan Magistrate may also take suo motu cognizance on the basis of any reliable report or information.
The mass marriages conducted on the day of akshay trutiya are not unknown. For the purposes of preventing solemnisation of mass child marriages on certain days such as Akshaya Trutiya, the District Magistrate shall be deemed to be the Child Marriage Prohibition Officer with all powers as are conferred on a Child Marriage Prohibition Officer by or under this Act. The District Magistrate shall also have additional powers to stop or prevent solemnisation of child marriages and for this purpose, he may take all appropriate measures and use the minimum force required.
Offences to be cognizable and non-bailable
Notwithstanding anything contained in the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, an offence punishable under The Prohibition of Child Marriage Act, 206 shall be cognizable and non-bailable.
Child Marriage Prohibition Officers
This statute also introduced the concept of special Child Marriage Prohibition Officers.
With the coming into force of the Act, the State Government shall, by notification in the Official Gazette, appoint for the whole State or such part thereof as may be specified in that notification, an officer or officers to be known as the Child Marriage Prohibition Officer having jurisdiction over the area or areas specified in the notification. The State Government may also request a respectable member of the locality with a record of social service or an officer of the Gram Panchayat or Municipality or an officer of the Government or any public sector undertaking or an office bearer of any non-governmental organisation to assist the Child Marriage Prohibition Officer and such member, officer or office bearer, as the case may be, shall be bound to act accordingly.
The duties of the CMPO are:
to prevent solemnisation of child marriages by taking such action as he may deem fit;
to collect evidence for the effective prosecution of persons contravening the provisions of this Act;
to advise either individual cases or counsel the residents of the locality generally not to indulge in promoting, helping, aiding or allowing the solemnisation of child marriages;
to create awareness of the evil which results from child marriages;
to sensitize the community on the issue of child marriages;
to furnish such periodical returns and statistics as the State Government may direct; and
to discharge such other functions and duties as may be assigned to him by the State Government.
The State Government may invest the Child Marriage Prohibition Officer with such powers of a police officer as may be needed and issue a notification in such respect. The Child Marriage Prohibition Officer shall have the power to move the Court for an order under sections 4, 5 and 13 and along with the child under section 3.
The Child Marriage Prohibition Officers shall be deemed to be public servants.
This Act is not in force as of now, i.e. sometimes after a statute receives the assent of the parliament, the state needs to develop the necessary machinery to actually put the Act and its provisions into action. It shall come into force on such date as the Central Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette, appoint; and different dates may be appointed for different States.
To stop such child marriages, governments and civil society organisations are trying to get laws against child marriage made stronger, since it does not seem to be working in its present state. Right now the police cannot make arrests without applying for a magistrate’s order, which may take days. The punishment, a maximum of three months in prison, and a fine is not enough to stop people. Proposed changes include more punishment, a compulsory registration of all marriages rather than just religious rites, the appointment of anti-child marriage officers in every state, and making it a law that anyone who attends a child marriage has to report it.
40% child marriages in India: UNICEF
Forty per cent of the world’s child marriages take place in India, resulting in a vicious cycle of gender discrimination, illiteracy and high infant and maternal mortality rates.
According to the UNICEF’s latest “State of the World’s Children-2009” report, discrimination on the basis of gender has a direct impact on maternal health. It can deny girls and women access to education, prevent them from receiving or seeking adequate health care and bar them from making critical decisions that can affect their health and that of the newborn.
Saving the lives of mothers and their newborns require more than just medical intervention. To be truly effective, these interventions must exist within an environment supportive of women’s rights. This, the report suggests, requires respect for the rights of women and children, quality education, a decent standard of living, protection from abuse, exploitation, discrimination and violence and empowerment of women.
Educating girls and women is not only pivotal to improving maternal and neonatal health, but it also has tangible benefits for families and societies.
Educated women are more likely to delay marriages, ensure their children are immunised, be better informed about nutrition for themselves and their children, and choose safer birth spacing practices. Their children have higher survival rates than those of uneducated women and tend to be better nourished.
Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh top list of child marriages
Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh have topped in the list of child marriages in India, a government data released on, Mar 30, 2010 said.
According to National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) report, the national capital has recorded one such incident in the year 2008.
This is only the second case reported from Delhi in this decade. It had recorded one such incident in 2003.
The report noted that 23 cases have been reported from Gujarat and 19 cases were reported in Andhra Pradesh.
The other states which reported child marriage cases in 2008 are Karnataka (9), Bihar (8), Punjab and West Bengal (6 each), Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra (5 each), Haryana, Kerala and Tamil Nadu (4 each), Rajasthan (3), Himachal and Madhya Pradesh (2 each) and Assam, Goa and Orissa (one each).
The Child Marriages that took place in India are 99 in 2006, 96 in 2007 and 104 in 2008 as per Crime in India 2008, a publication of National Crimes Records Bureau in India. This is only a tip of the iceberg but in reality most of the Child Marriages go unreported in India as the Child Marriages are sloemnised willingly by the family members and they feel that it is not a crime and hence no report comes against it. It can be prevented only when the society is educated, especially the girls.
Hours after the Union Cabinet on 19.08.2010 cleared a 300 per cent salary hike, from Rs. 16,000 to Rs. 50,000, for members of Parliament and doubled their perks, they appeared to be a dissatisfied lot and stalled the Lok Sabha proceedings thrice during the day, demanding more money.
Though the Cabinet, which met in Delhi under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, approved the Bill seeking a three-fold increase in the basic salary of MPs, it fell short of the Rs. 80,001 recommended by a joint parliamentary committee, which stated that an MP should get at least Re. 1 more than the top Central government bureaucrats.
Besides salary, an MP gets an allowance of Rs.1,000 for each day the Parliament is in session or for taking part in House committee meetings. This has been doubled. A member is also entitled to a constituency allowance of Rs.20,000 a month and an office expense allowance of Rs.20,000 a month. These perks have also been doubled.
The increase will be given with retrospective effect from May 2009, when the 15th Lok Sabha was constituted. However, the increase will be implemented when the Bill seeking amendment to the Salaries and Allowances of Members of Parliament Act, 1954, is brought in Parliament and passed by both the Houses.
The deadlock over MPs’ salary hike ended on 20.08.2010 after the government’s trouble-shooter Pranab Mukherjee met agitating parliamentarians who are unhappy with the three-fold increase and are demanding a 500 per cent raise. The government is likely to consider marginally increasing the hike, official sources said.
How much an MP will now get?
The following is the summary of monetary benefits MPs are entitled to as salary and other perks which were on 19.08.2010 proposed to be hiked manifold.
Each MP gets:
Basic salary of Rs 16,000. The salary has been hiked by 300 percent as proposed by the cabinet.
Daily allowance of Rs 1,000 for each day when parliament is in session or taking part in house committee meetings. This has been doubled.
Constituency allowance of Rs 20,000 a month. This has been doubled.
Office expense allowance of Rs 20,000 each month. Also doubled.
Conveyance allowance of Rs 1 lakh, which has gone up to Rs 4 lakh now.
Spouses of MPs get free train travel from their place of residence to Delhi. They also get up to eight free plane tickets from their place of residence to Delhi.
With pay hike, an MP to cost Rs 37 Lakh a year
Not satisfied with a three-fold hike in their basic salary, many MPs stalled Parliament proceedings on 19.08.2010, saying that the “low” hike was an insult to the country’s legislators. But do these MPs have a case? Times of India did some calculations to help our MPs do a reality check on how their pay packet compares with countries around the world.
In comparison with legislators from the developed world, Indian MPs may appear to be poorly paid when we compare basic salaries at normal forex rates. However, this can be misleading.
It’s well known that basic salary is only a small part of the overall compensation given to an MP. Hence we did some calculations to get a rough estimate of the overall cost of an MP to his or her country by finding out the approximate monetary values of various perks and allowances. Converting this into international dollars in terms of purchasing power parity (the same benchmark that makes India the world’s fourth largest economy), it works out that Indian MPs cost more to the country than their counterparts in Singapore, Japan and Italy — nations globally known for their highly paid politicians.
Without including accommodation, travel, medical facilities and water charges, and taking 151 Parliament session days (from June 1, 2009 to June 1, 2010) as the annual average, it works out that the new salaries and allowances (constituency allowance, office, telephone, internet, furniture, electricity, daily allowances) given to an MP is worth more than Rs 20 lakh annually.
Now, consider the accommodation provided free or at nominal rates to MPs at some of the most upscale localities in the country — places like Lodhi Estate, Aurangzeb Road, Tughlak Lane, Akbar Road and Ferozeshah Road in Lutyens Delhi — where rent for a two or three BHK flat can go up to Rs 2 lakh a month. We can safely assume that an MP living at these places gets an additional perk of Rs 1 lakh per month by way of saving rent.
To calculate the average cost of air travel of an MP, we considered Kolkata as a point of reference (some constituencies may be farther or nearer) and assumed that an MP travels by Air India booking the ticket one week in advance. By that count, the 34 single air journeys that each MP is entitled to in a year, costs Rs 5 lakh. This brings an MP’s compensation to more than Rs 37 lakh annually.
When converted to PPP dollars, each MP’s pay and perks work out to 2.2 lakh PPP dollars — higher than the salary plus perks of MPs in Singapore (2.1 lakh) Japan (1.9 lakh) and Italy (1.9 lakh). In comparison, the cost to country of an MP in Pakistan — at 46,000 PPP dollars — makes legislators in that country appear positively poor.
There’s another way of looking at the pay packets of our MPs — by comparing it with the people they claim to represent. India’s per capita GDP being $ 3,176 (PPP), it works out that after the hikes our MPs will cost the country 68 times more than what an average Indian earns annually. That makes the disparity in India between the citizen’s average income and an MP’s cost to country, among the highest in the world. Kenya is an example of an even higher disparity, with its MPs earning 180 times the average population. The ratio is 35 for the US while for most of Western Europe and Japan, the cost of an MP doesn’t exceed 10 times the country’s per capita income.
MPs may get Rs.10,000 more – 21.08.2010
The government appears to have achieved a compromise with the Opposition parties on the issue of increasing the salary and allowances of members of Parliament. The constituency allowance will be hiked by Rs. 5,000 and the secretarial allowance by Rs. 5,000, adding up to Rs. 10,000 a month.
Kangaroo Court or Katta Panchayat is one where there is an unfair trial in which the rights of the accused and precepts of justice are ignored and the outcome is usually known beforehand.
The origins of the term are obscure. Oddly, it does not seem to have originated in Australia; the first uses of the term are found in the American West in the 1850’s. None of the theories of its origin are particularly plausible. The most appealing version has it that “kangaroo courts” initially tried “claim jumpers”, and the name arose from associative wordplay.
It is a self-appointed or mob-operated tribunal that disregards or parodies existing principles of law or human rights, esp. one in a frontier area or among criminals in prison. It is also a crudely or irregularly operated court, esp. one so controlled as to render a fair trial impossible.
A kangaroo court or kangaroo trial, sometimes likened to a drumhead court-martial, refers to a sham legal proceeding or court. The colloquial phrase “kangaroo court” is used to describe judicial proceedings that deny due process rights in the name of expediency. Such rights include the right to summon witnesses,
the right of cross-examination,
the right not to incriminate oneself,
the right not to be tried on secret evidence,
the right to control one’s own defense,
the right to exclude evidence that is improperly obtained, irrelevant or inherently inadmissible, e.g., hearsay, the right to exclude judges or jurors on the grounds of partiality or conflict of interest, and
the right of appeal.
The outcome of a trial by “kangaroo court” is essentially determined in advance, usually for the purpose of providing a conviction, either by going through the motions of manipulated procedure or by allowing no defense at all.
July 13 2010- Katihar, Bihar
A 35-year-old woman was allegedly stripped and whipped after she defied the diktat of a kangaroo court in Bihar’s Katihar district to remarry her second husband. The illegal court at the Gwaltoli-Kalyannagar village summoned the woman on July 8 2010 and directed her to remarry her second husband from whom she had divorced earlier claimed SP P Kanan, quoting the FIR lodged by her.
Kanan said the woman’s first husband died four years after their marriage and then she married Mohammad Islam of the same village and the couple had a son. But, the marriage did not work and the couple divorced.
Subsequently, when her five-year-old son was down with fever, she had to call her divorced husband as she was living in penury. After the son recovered, Islam left. Kanan said Islam and his brother Samsuddin later connived in summoning the kangaroo court which was headed by a former mukhiya, Akalu.
The kangaroo court first asked her to pay money equivalent to that required for construction of a house, besides wheat and rice to the former mukhiya. As she refused she was dragged to a mangrove on the outskirts of the village, stripped and whipped.
This incident raises a question regarding India’s so-called democracy. Kangaroo courts have been the bane of India. What is a kangaroo court and how is it reigning supremacy in India?
Kangaroo Courts in Tamil Nadu
In India, despite repeated court directives to end the practice, the system of dispensing ‘justice’ through kangaroo courts continues in rural and urban places like Tamil Nadu, Haryana etc. Interaction with leaders of political parties, activists of human rights organisations, lawyers and police officials reveal that the illegal system has its pervasive influence in almost all sectors and in rural and urban areas.
A. Manoharan and his wife, Vanitha, who, along with their two daughters, have been ostracised from their hamlet, Panaiyur Periakuppam in Kancheepuram district, by the “meenavar” panchayat, a kangaroo court, over a land dispute. The Madras High Court ordered police protection to the family, but they continue to live in fear.
The Madras High Court has again come down heavily on the katta panchayats (kangaroo courts) operating in different parts of Tamil Nadu. Through an order on December 19, 2008, it directed the authorities concerned to take effective steps to curb the activities of these extrajudicial bodies.
The High Court, in its latest order, chastised the (fishermen’s) panchayat of Panaiyur Periakuppam hamlet in Kancheepuram district for issuing a fiat excommunicating a family following a land dispute. As per the court’s direction to provide protection to the “excommunicated” family, the police entered the hamlet inhabited by 255 fishermen’s families on December 20, 2008.
A. Manoharan, head of the ostracised family, claims that he lived in perpetual fear though the kattapanchayatdars were lying low owing to the police presence in the hamlet. He said that even on the day after the High Court passed its order, a gang instigated by the panchayat stormed his residence, forcing them to put up a grill door to protect themselves.
According to him, Krishnan was not only prevented from entering the village but also asked to hand over possession of a portion of the disputed land to the panchayat. They had sought an apology from Manoharan’s wife, Vanitha, for lodging a complaint with the police alleging that functionaries of the panchayat were threatening her family with excommunication if a solution was not found to the land issue. She was also barred from meeting her father.
As Manoharan and his wife did not budge, the panchayat made a public announcement to residents of the hamlet that no one should communicate with or help the family, including the children. Those who violated the decision would be excommunicated and a fine of Rs.10,000 would be imposed on them, it said. Close on the heels of the announcement, miscreants went on the rampage at the coconut grove owned by Manoharan, destroying coconuts.
Pervasive influence
With economic and social relations in the rural areas undergoing a transformation, even the traditional oor (community) panchayats in several villages have started losing their importance. In some other villages, the composition of such panchayats has changed drastically and they have been reduced to kangaroo courts controlled by self-styled village heads assisted by their henchmen. In certain places they control the village’s resources too. They continue to award punishments while settling family, civil and monetary disputes.
Functionaries of the Tamil Nadu Village Panchayat Presidents’ Federation pointed out that the katta panchayat system existed in 30 per cent of the 12,618 villages in the State.
These panchayats are strikingly similar to the khap panchayats of Haryana insofar as issuing fatwas and awarding punishments such as fines and social boycotts. Both courts mean to silence the new social forces that have risen from among the deprived sections of society, women and Dalits and are challenging status quoist forces. Predictably, women are kept away from these kangaroo courts.
Certain judges have observed that many actions taken by the katta panchayat result in deprivation of social status, access to basic facilities like food, water and shelter, denial of cultural facilities like common worship, access to religious events, etc., and denial of economic opportunities like employment, finances, etc. As such, these would constitute violation of human rights guaranteed.
In a particular case recently, an employee of the Telecom Department, along with her mother, was summoned by six panchayatdars of Valayapatti village in Tiruchi district and ordered to pay a fine of Rs.50, 000 for not complying with their direction to her to join her husband. The panchayatdars also made the victims prostrate before them repeatedly from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. to reduce the quantum of fine.
The shrinking area under cultivation owing to the non-profitability of agriculture against the backdrop of globalisation, the lack of alternative jobs and the escalating problem of unemployment in rural areas have contributed in a big way to the flourishing of katta panchayats.
R. Nallakannu, veteran leader of the Communist Party of India and chairman of the central control commission of the party, is of the view that the erstwhile oor panchayats in villages have given way to katta panchayats run by persons who have close links with “dadas” and certain political bigwigs operating in cities and towns. Police intervention is totally absent whenever the kattapanchayatdars indulge in out-of-court arbitration, he says, and adds that the illegal system has percolated from the district and taluk headquarters to the villages now.
Katta panchayats in rural areas are run by a combination of the rural rich, contractors and anti-social elements. The katta panchayat is used against people’s movements even as the law-enforcing authority turns a blind eye to it. In many cases, officials have been hand in glove with those running katta panchayats.
As in any other conflict, women and the weaker sections, including Dalits, bear the brunt of the onslaught of the katta panchayat.
In urban areas, the katta panchayat has assumed an entirely different role fostered by the politician-anti-social nexus, particularly in the wake of the real estate boom in recent years. In Chennai and other cities and major towns, they are run by underworld dons, who adopt strategies such as the forging of documents to resort to illegal arbitration and the intimidation and abduction of victims to deal with cases relating to property disputes, business rivalries and money transactions.
In Madurai and its suburbs, the menace has reached a level where property deals worth more than Rs.2 crore cannot be registered unless they are cleared by certain politically influential persons, claims S. Selva Gomathi, secretary of the human rights wing of the Society for Community Organisation Trust.
In certain areas katta panchayats are also run by political functionaries, mostly belonging to the ruling party because it is they who are powerful, have the protection of political godfathers, and have the tacit assistance of officials of the law-enforcing agencies, says Anita Tiphagne, a functionary of People’s Watch. According to her, “the katta panchayat does not follow any principle of the rule of law. It is, therefore, a system of justice delivery by the powerful using their power and very often silencing the powerless.”
The most dangerous aspect of the katta panchayat relates to caste discrimination, more particularly in villages in Madurai, Ramanthapuram, Pudukottai and Sivaganga districts, according to T. Lajapathiroy, joint secretary of the Madurai unit of the Lawyers for Human Rights. Persons belonging to traditionally powerful families of the dominant communities, who run the katta panchayat, issue fatwas prohibiting Dalits from purchasing land in some areas while in some other areas tenants are forced to leave the land they cultivate.
Citing an example in a village at Melur taluk in Madurai district, he says Dalits have been prevented from participating in the auction of temple land. “If any person violates the ‘fatwa’, his/her entire family will be excommunicated.”
He claims two Dalits of Thennagarampatti village were murdered in July 1992 for violating the panchayat’s order, and the Karur Sessions Court awarded double life imprisonment against 26 persons in the case in August 2008. According to a study done by Thamizmurasu, from 1983 to 2007 a total of 27 Dalits were murdered in Madurai district alone for not honouring katta panchayat’s decisions.
The cumbersome process of disposal of cases by courts is said to be a major factor contributing to the mushrooming of katta panchayats, which yield instant results. According to official sources, as many as 3.9 lakh civil cases and 36,000 criminal cases were pending in the Madras High Court. In the subordinate courts, the numbers as on December 31, 2007, were nearly five lakh civil cases and 4.30 lakh criminal cases.
Opinions differ on the question of adequacy of the laws to curb the katta panchayat menace. Justice Karpagavinayagam, in his judgment on April 8, 2004, said that having regard to the alarming situation, which has become uncontrollable, the court found it proper to suggest to the government that it would be advisable to issue an ordinance exclusively for eradicating the evil of katta panchayats.
As the persons associated with the katta panchayat more often than not were officials of the State/local administration/police, they must be made aware of the provisions under which action can be taken against katta panchayats and that even a private party could not violate Articles 21, 23 and 25 of the Constitution and all were bound by Article 51-A, she had submitted then.
Officials feel that amendments are needed to the property registration and rent control laws to prevent the registration of forged documents. Director General of Police K.P. Jain recently sent a circular to police officers listing 14 guidelines to be followed while dealing with disputes relating to land and money matters. The circular made it clear that katta panchayats should be dealt with severely.
As per the court’s direction, the then Chief Secretary to the Tamil Nadu government had sent separate letters to all departments in November 2003 stating that government servants should not be allowed to involve themselves in katta panchayats. In pursuance of that, the then Director General of Police sent letters to subordinate officers to take effective steps against katta panchayats by registering first information reports (FIRs).
A Division Bench of the High Court said in 2005 that in its opinion, katta panchayats could not flourish in the first place without the collusion of the police and other authorities, or by their turning a blind eye to these unlawful activities. If such unlawful, extra-constitutional activities are not put down with an iron hand, there will gradually be a collapse of law and order and democracy in the State. Hence the division directed all the State authorities to take strong action in accordance with the law to put down these unlawful, hooligan activities which have mushroomed in several areas of the State of Tamil Nadu and institute criminal prosecution against those who are involved.
Katta panchayats are unofficially run, and are in fact usurped powers by rowdies, who rule and run parallel governance in India. While such kangaroo courts are present elsewhere also they are more common in India than elsewhere. In the case of Kangaroo courts practiced in India, the rowdies who pass these judgments, always award the punishments to innocent people and free the actual cultprits/criminals. Or if they punish a person, that would be for such a silly reason that it does not warrant even a reprimand or a few abuses. But in Kangaroo courts the punishments will be rapes or amputations of men´s legs. Very rarely the actual culprits or criminals would get the punishment through kangaroo courts.
Interestingly all the law enforcing agencies including police, intelligence, judiciary and the officialdom know about the operation of these kangaroo courts but none of them can do any thing to stop them. The main reason is all the government agencies are passive or active associates of these kangaroo courts and the associated criminals. For any problem, crime, issue that are small or big, constitutionally valid laws or courts are not given importance as the law enforcing agencies are there to mediate and investigate the cases.
Now the most unfortunate situation is since the highly educated experts in the legal system were of no use/could help the innocent victims, if and when they prefer to go through the proper channel (legal process) the case is much worse. Because most of the people who sit in the kangaroo courts passing the judgments do not know a,b,c,ds of the language or even the vernacular languages let alone the law. Now one can imagine what kind of judgments such people pass on the innocent people. Without going into the correctness of the judgments, the public silently absorb all the atrocities, lest their heads will roll if they protest or argue against the judgments. Who is the final authority to give these judgments? The one who passes the street-fight successfully showing strength in a fist of fury. This is the basis to become the person who can pass judgments.
A few examples wherein severe punishments are given for silly reasons by the kangaroo courts are: (i) Sitting posture of a person (even within his/her home) could be offending to some people who are desperate to find an excuse to escape from their crimes (enough for a murder or rape), (ii) A male walking on the road and a girl/woman crosses opposite and in a fraction of a second the man inadvertently might have looked at the other person or did not look also (that is enough to say that this fellow has seen the girl/woman and hence some atrocities could be committed against him or his relatives). In the above case, even if he had looked at the person who is coming in the opposite direction or somewhere along his walk, nothing would have happened to the girl/woman. But the kangaroo courts immediately swing into action to amputate the person or his relatives or rape one of the relatives of the man who walked along the road, are awarded, as it seems to be the case.
Disadvantages of Katta Panchayat (Kangaroo Courts)
The person sitting on top of the katta panchayats are mostly the ones with muscle power only. Of course they would know all the Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections as they frequent jail for different types of crimes. The people of Katta panchayats are illiterate and they cannot be a match to an educated judge sitting in a High Court or a Supreme Court. The only thing that they know or their philosophy is street fights. They think that they are doing correct thing and are passing correct judgments. If the Judges, Public Prosecutors, Investigating officer could be bribed or bought, is it difficult to purchase a Katta panchayat leader or the person who is passing these judgments in the Katta panchat? For them some flimsy reasons are enough to indulge serious crimes on innocents. These Katta panchayat people have all sorts of cheating as their weapons and sometimes there will be a competition between the rowdies and the police as to who cheats the public better.
What is the remedy to prevent these kangaroo courts that run parallel government. The law of the land has to extend its long arm to chase them away and keep a watch on their activities. Anywhere, any body passing individual judgments or threatening innocent people have to be booked. The whole network of these kangaroo courts and their tenter hooks wherever they are have to be broken to restore a real democracy instead of the democracy followed now which is a farce.
Ladakh, a part of Jammu & Kashmir State in north of Indiaconsisting of two districts Leh and Kargil. Leh with an area of 45110 Sq Km makes it largest district in the country in terms of area. It lies between 32 to 36 degree North latitude and 75 degree to 80 degree East longitude. The district is bounded by Pakistan occupied Kashmir in the West and China in the north and eastern part and Lahul Spiti of Himachal Pradesh in South East.
It is at a distance of 434 Kms from Srinagar and 474 Kms from Manali. Leh district comprises of Leh town and 112 inhabited villages and one un-inhabited village. The total population of Leh district is 1,17,232.
History of Leh:
In the ancient times the present Leh district was a part of Greater Ladakh spread over from Kailash Mansarover to Swaat (Dardistan). The Greater ladakh was neither under the Domain of Tibet or its influence. Not much information is available about the ancient History of Ladakh. However, reference about the place and its neighbourhood in Arab, Chinese and Mongolian histories gives an idea that in the 7th Century A.D fierce wars were fought by Tibet and China in Baltistan area of the Greater Ladakh in which deserts and barren mountains of Ladakh was turned into battle fields for the warring armies.
In the 8th century A.D Arabs also jumped into these wars and changed their sides between China and Tibet. Around this period, the ruler of Kashmir, Laltadita conquered Ladakh. In the 8th Century A.D itself, The Arabs conquered Kashghar and established their control over Central asia which embraced Islam in the 9th century A.d and thus a buffer state came into being between Tibet and China, terminating the hostilities between the two warring countries. The greater Ladakh also fell into peices.
The ancient inhabitants of Ladakh were Dards, and Indo-Aryan race from down the Indus. But immigration from Tibetmore than a thousand years ago largly overwhelmedthe culture of the Dards and moped up their racial characters. IN eastern and central Ladakh, todays population seems to be mostly of Tibet origin. Budhism reached Tibet from India via Ladakh. The area was the stronghold of Budhism before Islam reached Ladakh.
A thousand years ago before the contol of Tibets rule, Raja Skitde Nemagon, ruled over Ladakh which was known as Muryul (Red Country), as most of the mountains and the soil in Ladakh wears a red tinge. In the 10th Century A.D Skitday Nemagon, along with a couple of hundred men, invaded Ladakh where there was no central authority. The Land was divided in small principalities, which were at war with each other. Nemagon defeated all of them and established a strong central authority. Those days Shey, was the capital of Ladakh became to be known as Nariskorsoom, a country of three provinces. The present Ladakh was divided into two provinces while the third comprised western Tibet. The area of western Tibet slipped away from the kingdom but was reunited in 16th Century A.D. by the famous Ladakhi ruler Sengge Namgyal. Ladakh was an independent country since the middle of 10th century.
In the post-partition senario, Pakistan and China illegally occupied 78,114 sq. km and 37,555 sq.km of the state, respectively while the remaining part of the state acceeded to India. Pakistan also illegally gifted 5180 sq.kms of this area to China. Ladakh, comprising the areas of present Leh and Kargil districts, became one of the seven districts of the State. In 1979 when the reorganisation of the districts was carries out, the Ladakh district was divided into two full fledged of Leh and Kargil.
Cloudburst on 6.08.2010
Flash floods and massive landslides, triggered by a series of cloudbursts, have killed 179 people and injured at least 607 in Leh town and its adjoining villages in the Ladakh division in Jammu and Kashmir on Thursday 5.08.2010 night.
What is Cloudburst?
A cloudburst is an extreme form of rainfall, sometimes mixed with hail and thunder, which normally lasts no longer than a few minutes but is capable of creating flood conditions. This leads to flash floods/ landslides, house collapse, dislocation of traffic and human casualties on large scale.
Cloudbursts descend from very high clouds, sometimes with tops above 15 kilometers. Meteorologists say the rain from a cloudburst is usually of the shower type with a fall rate equal to or greater than 100mm (3.94 inches) per hour.
During a cloudburst, more than 2cm of rain may fall in a few minutes. When there are instances of cloudbursts, the results can be disastrous. Rapid precipitation from cumulonimbus clouds is possible due to so called Langmuir precipitation process in which large droplets can grow rapidly by coagulating with smaller droplets which fall down slowly.
The Disaster
85 bodies have been recovered from the flooded areas as per the statement of J and K Director General of Police Kuldeep Khoda. Among the dead were three jawans of the Army Service Corps. He said that at least 350 people are in the army hospital with injuries, and that many more people were trapped under houses and buildings that have collapsed.
He said a massive rescue operation was underway involving the state police, paramilitary forces and the army in Leh town.
According to sources, the cloudburst happened between 12.30 and 1.00 am on Friday the 6th of August 2010.
The BSNL network was completely damaged, besides the runway of the Leh airport, cutting off the town from the rest of the country. The district hospital and two buildings which were housing offices of the Union Home Ministry were also affected.
Five villages have been hit in the sudden downpour and flashfloods. These included Choglumsar and Shapoo. Old Leh city was among the worst affected. The main bus stand was flattened.
Leh is located at a height of 11,500 feet above sea level, 424 kilometres from Srinagar. The worst hit was Choglumsar area, 13 kms from here, where 14 bodies were recovered.
A polytechnic college, headquarters of the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL), the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) camp, and many government offices and houses have been damaged. The Leh airport has been inundated.
Prof. Shakeel Romshoo, a geologist at Srinagar University, said new rivulets had cut deep channels in the mountain gorges of the region and flood waters had inundated low-lying areas.
He said that it was a challenging topography with steep and unstable slopes. Water flow and velocity being very high, the flash floods have caused huge damage.
Makhdoomi said the rainfall started before midnight and that water later started coursing down the area’s mountains in streams and rivulets. The flooding had damaged several homes and other buildings by Friday morning. There was utter confusion and people started to panic.
As many as 6,000 army men, and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and police personnel have launched a massive relief and rescue operation.
Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, while expressing grief over the tragedy, has directed the civil and police administration to undertake relief and rescue work on a war footing. All flights from Delhi to Leh have been cancelled.
Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar and Rajya Sabha Chairman Hamid Ansari condoled the loss of life and property due to floods triggered by a massive cloudburst in Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir. Ansari said he joined all citizens in sending condolences to the members of the bereaved families and prayed to the Almighty to grant them the strength to withstand the immense loss.
The matter was raised in the Lok Sabha by Hassan Khan, an Independent member from Ladakh. He wanted the relief and restoration work to be taken up at the earliest as there was very little time before winter set in and hit transport links in the region. Raising the matter during Zero Hour, he demanded speedy disbursal of compensation to those affected by the flash floods caused by the cloudburst.
Meanwhile, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi expressed deep sorrow and grief over the loss of lives due to flash floods in Leh. Gandhi wished speedy recovery to the injured.
Over 100 people were killed and another 370 injured when flash floods triggered by torrential rains struck Leh town in Ladakh region.
8th August 2010
A day after a wall of mud and water flattened Leh and several villages, the gloom deepened in the tourist city, even as the death toll rose to 132. Meanwhile, fears grew that many of at least 500 missing residents could be buried under the debris.
The Army, which is spearheading relief and rescue operations, said soldiers had recovered 110 bodies. The J&K police put the number at 132. Director-general of J&K police, Kuldeep Khoda, said 53 of the bodies had been identified.
With Leh’s cellphone hub destroyed, makeshift communication links were established to enable video conferencing. The runway was repaired enough to restore the air link with the rest of the country. IAF flew in transport aircraft carrying relief material, including blankets, dry food and medicines to meet the immediate requirements of victims, including more than 3,000 tourists stranded there, a defence spokesman said.
However, the road to Leh from Srinagar through the Zojila pass and the Rohtang pass remained unusable as bridges had been washed away by mudslides. Four kilometres of the Manali-Leh highway was washed away by floods beyond Sachru.
Scores of stranded tourists joined in the rescue efforts. There were six surgeons among the holidaymakers and they toiled for more than 24 hours, shoulder to shoulder with Army surgeons and doctors to treat more than 300 victims. They conducted 22 major life-saving operations and 45 minor ones. At least 94 people are still in the makeshift hospitals.
9th August 2010
Five armymen were killed in the cloudburst at Leh and other areas of the region while 33 personnel, swept away in flash floods that struck a camp near Siachen glacier, are yet to be traced.
The Army has sought Pakistan’s help to rescue the soldiers, including three junior commissioned officers, who were manning Tyakshi post in Turtuk sector, about 150 metres from the Line of Control.
The personnel still remain untraced despite the Army deploying men, helicopters and catch nets in nearby river Shyok. Official sources said the Director General Military Operation has informed the Pakistani counterpart about possibility of some army personnel being washed away in areas under their control.
The soldiers had faced the fury of a swollen Shyok river when Leh was hit by flash floods following a devastating cloudburst. The missing personnel belonged to Bihar Regiment and Raj Rif Regiment, GOC of 14 Corps Lieutenant General S K Singh said in Leh.
It is feared that some of the missing personnel could be buried under slush. Unlike in other places where the height of slush is about 4 to 5 feet, it is about 20—25 feet where the army camp had once stood.
The Army also reported the death of five of its personnel in the cloudburst at Leh, Choglamsar, Nimu, Tyakshi, Batalik and Karu in the region.
It said defence personnel, their aircraft and equipment continued to be deployed in the relief and rescue efforts.
The Army said it has deployed 41 columns comprising 4,100 men in the ongoing relief operations at Leh and adjoining areas hit by calamity.
In addition, Army troops are assisting Border Roads Organisation (BRO) in creating diversions at several damaged bridge sites on National Highway-1D. Two of the 11 bridges that were damaged in the cloudburst were made operational at Phyang and Choglamsar.
Communication requirements of the district administration were being maintained by two INMARSATs equipment provided by the Army.
Soldiers to the Rescue
Rescue and relief teams continued their relentless efforts to locate survivors in the Leh district of Jammu & Kashmir’s Ladakh region.
Apart from providing succour to the victims, the relief teams were also engaged in round-the-clock operations to restore communication and power links which were snapped by the floods and mudslides. Authorities feared many more bodies could be found when the rescue teams moved into the affected villages in remote areas and cleared the rubble.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Defence said six Cheetah helicopters of the Indian Air force made more than 60 sorties since sunrise on 8th August to evacuate 90 people from Skyu in the Zanskar valley. About 130 trekkers, mainly foreigners from 12 different countries and some Indian porters, were reported to have been stranded at Skyu.
The location could be reached only by Cheetah helicopters owing to flight through a narrow constricted valley which was not negotiable by the large rotor Mi-17 helicopters. The remaining trekkers managed to negotiate their way to safer places on their own.
With touchdowns not feasible at Skyu at the location that had virtually transformed into a vast dissolving island where none existed earlier, the daring rescue efforts were all carried out by the pilots at low hover, a challenging flight manoeuvre of keeping the aircraft stationary, perilously close to the ground even as passengers boarded the flight. Each Cheetah helicopter can only take in a maximum of three passengers at sea level on board at a time.
The breakdown of the 81 foreigners rescued included United Kingdom-17, France-17, Netherland-9, Czechoslovakia-8, Germany-7, Israel-4, Switzerland-4, Romania-4, Austrian-3, Australia-3, Italy-3 and Spain-2. Six local guides and three porters were also among those evacuated.
The spokesman said three IL-76 sorties airlifted two excavators and one 22-tonne bulldozer, apart from six tonnes of communication equipment and another ten tonnes of army communication equipment, including cables, from Chandigarh.
Six AN-32 also flew air maintenance sorties from Chandigarh, replenishing stocks and relief materials for the Army in the region. IAF aircraft earlier had already airlifted medical equipment, medicines and para-medical personnel to Leh from New Delhi and Chandigarh.
As many as 41 columns of the Indian army are engaged in the rescue and relief operations. Army troops are also assisting the Border Roads Organisation in creating diversions at the sites of various damaged bridges on National Highway (NH) 1D. Two bridges have also been launched at Phyang and Choglamsar.
The Army is also making provisions to meet the requirements of large tents for establishment of Field Hospital, tents for displaced persons, firewood for cremation of dead bodies and provisioning of generator sets as projected by the District Administration.
There were chaotic scenes at the Leh airport where hundreds of foreign tourists and others as well as workers waited for flights out of the area.
The Ministry of Civil Aviation has requested the airlines to operate additional flights at concessional rates to evacuate the stranded persons.
National carrier Air India and private operators such as Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines have operated 27 flights since August 7 and evacuated 3241 persons from Leh. The additional flights are expected to continue until the evacuation process is completed.
An official press release said the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) was closely monitoring the fares being charged by the airlines, which have already been cautioned against exploiting the situation and jacking up the fares.
The average of actual fare charged by Air India was Rs. 9000 and whereas it was between Rs. 8157 and 8700 for Jet Airways and Rs. 6200 for Kingfisher in the last three days since the cloud burst.
It said the Ministry and the DGCA had not received any complaint regarding over-charging by the airlines. In fact, the release claims that the airlines have reduced their fares.
The road approaches to Leh from Srinagar through Zozilla and from Rohtang Pass had been cut off because bridges had been washed away by the mudslides.
The Leh District Administration has set up a 24 hours control room to coordinate relief and rescue operations. Giving an overview of the extend of damage to the military establishment, an officer of the army said small culverts and bridges used for going to many forward locations have been destroyed and it will take quite some time before these can be re-built.
Talking about the missing army personnel in Tyakshi border post in Turtuk sector, about 150 metres from the Line of Control, Singh said too much of water got into one of the streams due to the cloudburst.
Meanwhile, the army said it was hopeful of reopening the two National Highways by the end of this week. Singh said as per the estimate, seven bridges are needed on the Zijia access and four on the Rohtang access. Two bridges near Leh were opened on 9th August 2010.
10th August 2010
The toll in the tragedy has risen to 179 and injured 607 with 400 people still missing.
Three French citizens – Augavelis Henri, Hellot Jacques and Daniel Hauri, an Italian identified as Riccardo Titton and Maromas Maria Lousdes from Spain have been declared dead.
Sixteen of the others killed are from Nepal, and two were Tibetans.
73 people, who were injured at different places due to cloudburst, were brought here in a IL-76 from Leh this morning as per group captain of IAF PM Vithalkar.
From the air field here, the injured were sent to different hospitals for specialised treatment in waiting ambulances, officials said, adding while 49 security personnel have been sent to Command Hospital at Udhampur, 24 civilians were rushed to Government Medical College hospital in Jammu.
What really happened to Leh?
Ladakh is an unusual place for a cloudburst because it is a cold desert region where average rain fall is low.
The source of this cloudburst was an intense convective cloud cluster that developed over east of Leh by about 9.30pm on 6.08.2010. Scientists say it began disgorging its moisture between 1.30am and 2am but no one knows how much rain it delivered.
This does not happen Himalayan desert altitudes. What causes this? The maximum ever recorded rainfall in Leh was 96.2 mm in a 24 hour period measured in 1933. This cloudburst yielded 250mm rainfall within an hour.
An air force observatory near Leh, some distance away from the cloudburst zone, only recorded 12.8 mm which, scientists point out, is not cloudburst-level rainfall. That is very interesting. That says it was an artificial cloudburst and so many presumptive theories are flouting and the correct reason for the sudden cloud burst is yet to be known.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on 17.08.2010 announced a Rs 125 crore relief packaged for the Leh cloudburst victims and said all houses destroyed by the natural calamity will be reconstructed within the next two-and-a-half months.
Dr. Singh, who arrived Leh on a day-long visit to take stock of relief and rehabilitation undertaken in the aftermath of flash floods in this mountainous region, said that the relief will be given from the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund.
“Hospital, school, electricity connections and roads will be rebuilt and all rehabilitation works will be completed within the next two-and-a-half months and before the onset of winter. Funds will not be a problem,” he said.
Dr. Singh said many lives have been lost during the tragedy which is irreparable but the Central and Jammu and Kashmir governments will take all possible measures to help the bereaved families.
The Prime Minister said a monitoring committee under the chairmanship of state Chief Secretary will be constituted to ensure effective implementation of various schemes for the affected people. “Before the onset of winter, I will again visit you and inspect the houses that will be constructed for you,” he said.
Dr. Singh also held a meeting with Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and state officials to discuss the steps being taken for the relief and rehabilitation measures.
The Prime Minister was accompanied by Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, Minister for New and Renewable Energy Farooq Abdullah and Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee Chief Saifuddin Soz.
The Prime Minister had promised in his Independence Day address that every possible effort would be made to provide relief to those hit by the calamity.
Dr. Singh had earlier announced an ex-gratia relief of Rs one lakh each to the kin of the deceased and Rs 50,000 each to the seriously injured from the PM’s National Relief Fund.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on 7.05.2010 assured the Lok Sabha that the government would soon take a decision on the Opposition demand for a caste-based census. “I am aware of the views of the Members of Parliament belonging to all sections. I assure you that the Cabinet will take a decision shortly,” Dr. Singh said in a brief statement.
The statement put at ease agitated Opposition members, particularly Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh, Rashtriya Janata Dal supremo Lalu Prasad and Janata Dal (United) leader Sharad Yadav. The three leaders and other Opposition members were ruffled over Home Minister P. Chidambaram’s reply to the debate on census. He said there were difficulties in conducting a caste-based census and the government would keep in mind the members’ views.
As soon as the Minister concluded his reply, which was punctuated by interruptions from the Opposition benches, and the House was adjourned to meet again at 2.30 p.m., on 7.5.2010, the three leaders approached the Prime Minister, Congress president Sonia Gandhi and leader of the House Pranab Mukherjee. They were seen talking to them, trying to elicit some kind of an assurance on their demand. They also held a meeting with Mr. Mukherjee separately, when BJP’s deputy leader Gopinath Munde was also present.
When Dr. Singh gave the assurance soon after the House reassembled, the three leaders thanked him and the Congress president for trying to resolve the matter in an amicable manner.
Earlier, while taking note of the discussion over the last two days that witnessed arguments and reasons for canvassing the question of caste, Mr. Chidambaram said the government was seized of the matter. “The views of honourable members will certainly be a valuable guide to the government,” he said in his statement, which virtually gave out nothing but offered explanation relating to the Census 2011 and preparation of the National Population Register (NPR), the two exercises which are on. The debate on the issue saw members cutting across party lines favouring a caste-based census.
Replying to the debate, the Home Minister stressed that the main aim of the exercise was headcount and listed difficulties in including caste in the list. The Registrar-General had pointed out a number of logistics and practical difficulties in canvassing the question of caste while conducting census. However, he assured the House that the government “will give due weight to all aspects of the issue.”
“The enumerator is not an investigator or verifier,” Mr. Chidambaram said, pointing out that 21 lakh enumerators — mostly primary school teachers — had no training or expertise to classify the answer as OBC or otherwise.
“There is a Central list of OBCs and State-specific lists of OBCs. Some States do not have a list of OBCs while some have a list of OBCs and a sub-set called Most Backward Castes,” he said.
Quoting the Registrar-General, Mr. Chidambaram said issues regarding methodology, avoiding phonetic and spelling errors, stage of canvassing of caste, maintaining integrity of enumeration and doing an accurate headcount of population would arise.
“The census is done under the authority of the Census Act, 1948. Census 2011 will be the 15{+t}{+h} national census since 1872 and the 7{+t}{+h} since Independence. Population census is the total process of collecting demographic, economic and social data. What is published as the census data are only aggregates; the information relating to the individual is confidential and not shared with anyone or any authority,” he said.
While throwing up the question if the census was the vehicle to carry out caste-based enumeration, he pointed out that records showed that an attempt was made by the Ministry of Social Justice to include caste as one of the questions that should be canvassed in the 2001 Census. “However, the government of the day — the NDA government — did not take a decision to that effect and maintained the policy that has been in force since 1951,” Mr. Chidambaram said.
GoM approval for caste- based census in India
Ending months of fractious debates across the political spectrum, a Group of Ministers ( GoM), headed by Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee, gave its seal of approval to the enumeration of caste in Census 2011 on 11.08.2010.
The GoM, sources said, has recommended that the caste headcount should be done at the biometric stage. Most significantly, it will not be just an OBC headcount, but a comprehensive caste headcount, with every citizen being asked which caste he or she belongs to. This data will be tabulated and analysed later to arrive at figures of different castes in the country, it is learnt. The GoM’s recommendations will now be taken to the Union Cabinet, and the caste headcount should begin in December, 2010, official sources said. The biometric phase will cover photographing, fingerprinting and iris mapping of all citizens over the age of 15 for the National Population Register ( NPR).
The GoM was set up after parties, cutting across the political spectrum, had vociferously backed a caste headcount in May, 2010 during the budget session of Parliament. Subsequently, when it appeared that the BJP was having second thoughts on the subject, because of RSS pressure, the Congress, which is deeply divided on the issue, decided that it would not proceed till it received written approvals for caste enumeration from all parties. Eventually, pushed by its OBC constituency, a reluctant BJP, too, gave its approval, leaving the Congress with no option but to go ahead with a caste headcount.
Cabinet to decide on modalities
The government on 12.08.2010 said a final decision on the modalities of inclusion of caste in the census would be taken by the Cabinet.
Making a statement in the Lok Sabha — a day after the Group of Ministers (GoM) agreed to include caste in the census — Leader of the House Pranab Mukherjee said the GoM had decided that caste would be canvassed without affecting the integrity of the headcount. An appropriate decision on the modalities of canvassing the caste was yet to be taken. How and when it would be done was still under consideration.
The Bharatiya Janata Party, the Janata Dal (United), the Samajwadi Party (SP) and the Rashtriya Janata Dal raised the issue when the House convened for the day demanding inclusion of caste in census at the headcount stage itself and not at the biometric stage as suggested in media reports.
“Biometric stage will never come,” Mulayam Singh (SP) said. Similar sentiments were expressed by Sharad Yadav (JD-U), who said the biometric stage would not come in the next “100 years” as the government was yet to complete the process of issuing photo election cards to the people.
The Opposition members said enumeration of castes would not be possible at the biometric stage as it was a “long-drawn” process. Moreover, only those above 15 years would be photographed and fingerprinted to create a biometric national database, they contended.
After Speaker Meira Kumar adjourned the proceedings till noon, as some of the members trooped into the well, the leaders of the parties met Mr. Mukherjee where it was agreed upon that the government would address their concerns and make a statement.
Tamil Nadu CM hails nod for caste-wise enumeration
Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi on 12.08.2010 welcomed the approval of the Group of Ministers (GoM) for enumeration of caste in Census 2011. Thanking the Centre, Mr Karunanidhi said the United Progressive Alliance government’s move was historic as such an enumeration would be done after a gap of nearly 80 years. He recalled Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s assurance to Parliament a few months ago in this regard. The latest move would be of great use to Tamil Nadu for implementing the Supreme Court’s latest order on the 69 per cent reservation law.
Letter to the Group of Ministers on caste Census – 14.08.2010
Honourable Members,
We welcome your decision to enumerate caste in Census 2011. This is a progressive and much needed step towards re- orienting our polity and revitalising the implementation of social policy.
We are, however, deeply distressed to learn that you have recommended that the collection of caste data be done in conjunction with the National Population Register ( NPR) process at the biometric data capture stage. We respectfully urge you to reconsider this move because it will not only defeat the very purpose of enumerating caste, but will condemn the entire exercise to almost certain failure.
Please note, Honourable Members, that even its most ardent supporters have never claimed that caste enumeration will be easy. Every Indian Census, for at least the past three decades, has been the largest and most complex project of its kind in human history. The Census of India ( or the Office of the Registrar General of India — ORGI) is the only competent agency in the country with the necessary expertise and experience to undertake this gigantic task. It has successfully collected caste data in the past, and with the vastly superior technological resources available today, it can do so again despite the challenge of enumerating 120 crore Indians. The collection of caste data at the stage of biometric capture would be cumbersome and time consuming. Outside agencies are likely to be involved, and therefore there are chances of data gathering being compromised because it would be tagged on to the huge task of biometric documentation of about 84 crore Indians. If caste data are compromised, it will defeat the very objectives that the data are meant to achieve. The respective time frames are also important — the Census enumeration phase will definitely be over by March 2011 whereas the biometric data capture process is likely to take much longer.
An even more decisive argument against attaching caste enumeration to biometric data capture is that, as of now, it is not clear what socio- economic or educational data — if any — will be available through this method.
If all we get is a headcount of castes among the 15- plus population, then the entire exercise is a waste. The main reason to enumerate caste is to enable the distribution of national resources and opportunities to be informed by empirical evidence on sex- ratios, literacy, life expectancy, occupation, household assets, and so on.
Without such evidence, all the problems that are blocking the implementation of social justice policies will remain unsolved. By contrast, we know that including caste in the existing enumeration process scheduled for February 2011 will enable all the data normally collected by the Census to be correlated with caste. This method will have the additional advantage of the close supervision of a trained body of census officials.
Finally, there are the constitutionallegal issues, and the crucial question of confidentiality. The Census Act 1948 provides strong protection for all data collected by the Census, and this has ensured that the Census — which necessarily collects individual information —has released only aggregated and anonymised data. Given the absence of such protection under the Citizenship Rules of 2003 — which governs the NPR and the biometric data capture process —there is every chance of the confidentiality of caste data being breached. If the main concern is to eliminate the possibility of inflation of numbers and to protect the integrity of the head count, then other measures are available. For example, the household population totals ( along with gender breakup) already collected in the House- listing and Housing Census Schedule can be used as a check on the caste data at the enumeration stage.
It is for all these reasons that, at a recent national conference organised by the Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion of the National Law School of India, Bengaluru, a group of distinguished academics, policy and legal experts agreed unanimously that the proper agency for caste enumeration is the ORGI, and the proper stage is the house- to- house Population Enumeration phase of Census 2011 to be conducted from February 9– 28, 2011. In fact, the group went so far as to issue a strong warning against associating caste enumeration with the NPR process.
Enumerating castes has compelling benefits for our society. It will invigorate our social justice policies; provide the credible evidence demanded by our judiciary; allow the revision of beneficiary group listings; and help profile India’s social diversity. Therefore, we congratulate you, Honourable Members, for having taken this bold and visionary step. We also appeal to you not to undo the good that you have done. We urge you to entrust caste enumeration to the tried and trusted census organisation and avoid the serious risks of linking it to biometric data capture.
Signatories to the above letter:
Dr. M. Vijayanunni, Former Registrar General and Census Commissioner of India, Justice M. N. Rao, Chairperson, National Commission for the Backward Classes, Prof. Sukhadeo Thorat, Chairperson, University Grants Commission, Prof. Satish Deshpande, Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics, Prof. Yogendra Yadav, Political Scientist, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Prof. S. Japhet, Director, Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion, National Law School of India, Bengaluru, Dr. Chandan Gowda, Associate Professor, Centre for the Study of Social Exclusion, National Law School of India, Bengaluru, Prof. Valerian Rodrigues, Political Scientist, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Prof. Ravi Varma Kumar, Senior Advocate and former Chairperson, Karnataka Backward Classes Commission.
Government of India finally agrees to caste census from 2011 - 9.9.2010
Giving in to demands from almost all political parties, government on 9.9.2010 decided to hold caste census in 2011 under an exercise to be carried out separately from the enumeration of population.
After several deliberations within the government on the politically-sensitive issue, the Union Cabinet decided to carry out a separate house-to-house caste enumeration from June to September 2011.
“After considering various options, the option that we have approved is, based on the responses of various political parties, that caste must be canvassed and the integrity of the headcount must not be affected,” Home Minister P Chidambaram told reporters while briefing on the decisions of the Cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
The caste enumeration will be conducted in a phased manner after the population enumeration, which will include biometric capture and headcount, is completed by March 2010, he said.
The decision has been taken after considering options suggested by the Group of Ministers (GoM) set up on the issue and the consultations that Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee held with leaders of various parties.
Chidambaram said a suitable legal regime for collection of data on castes would be formulated in consultation with the Ministry of Law and Justice.
The office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner would conduct the field operations of the caste enumeration. The Central government will constitute an expert group to classify the caste/tribe returns after the enumeration is completed.
The office of the Registrar General and Census Commissioner would hand over the details of the castes/tribes returned in the enumeration to the proposed expert group.
The last caste-wise census was held in 1931 and such a practice had been given up as a matter of policy after Independence.
Caste census in June-September next year – 1.10.2010
The caste-based census would be carried out by the government between June and September, 2011, Home Minister P. Chidambaram announced on 1.10.2010.
“It was decided that Caste will be canvassed through a separate house-to-house survey between June and September, 2011,” Mr. Chidambaram told.
Bowing to demands by several political parties, government had in August, 2010 decided to carry out a separate caste census from 2011.
Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee had told the Lok Sabha that all political parties had supported the idea of including caste in census and there was no need for any “apprehensions” over the issue.
His statement had come after leaders of BJP, JD(U), BSP and Samajwadi Party wanted to know as to what happened to the government’s promise to carry out a caste census.
The Group of Ministers, which examined the issue, had decided that caste census should be carried out during house enumeration exercise.
“Health tourists” flocking to south Asia have carried a new class of antibiotic-resistant superbugs to Britain, researchers reported on 11.08.2010, warning that the bacteria could spread worldwide.
This so called NDM-1 gene was first identified last year by Cardiff University’s Timothy Walsh in two types of bacteria — Klebsiella pneumoniae and Escherichia coli — in a Swedish patient admitted to hospital in India. NDM-1 stands for New Delhi metallo-betalactamase-1.
Worryingly, the new NDM-1 bacteria are resistant even to carbapenems, a group of antibiotics often reserved as a last resort for emergency treatment for multi-drug resistant bugs.
Researchers said the bugs had been brought into Britain by patients who travelled to India or Pakistan for cosmetic surgery. “If these infections were allowed to continue without appropriate treatment, then certainly one would expect to see some sort of mortality,” Walsh, a microbiology professor, told BBC radio. “It’s going to be very difficult to treat the infections once the patients present with these types of bacteria. You won’t get well.”
In the new study, led by Walsh and Madras University’s Karthikeyan Kumarasamy, researchers set out to determine how common the NDM-1 producing bacteria were in South Asia and Britain, where several cases had turned up. Checking hospital patients with suspect symptoms, they found 44 cases (1.5 per cent) of those screened in Chennai, and 26 (eight per cent) of those screened in Haryana. They likewise found the superbug in Bangladesh and Pakistan, as well as 37 cases in Britain, some in patients who had recently returned from having cosmetic surgery in India or Pakistan. “India also provides cosmetic surgery for other Europeans and Americans, and it is likely that NDM—1 will spread worldwide,” said the study, published in The Lancet.
NDM-1 was mostly found in E. coli, a common source of community-acquired urinary tract infections, and K. pneumoniae, and was impervious to all antibiotics except two, tigecycline and colistin.
India rejects superbug linkage
India has reacted strongly to a study linking a multiple drug-resistant superbug detected in Britain to India and said the bacteria are not a public health threat. It said Indian hospitals were safe as a number of such bacteria survived in nature and were reported from several other countries.
The conclusions of the study are “loaded with inference” that the antibiotic-resistant organism possibly originated in India, an official statement by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said in New Delhi on 12.08.2010. “While such organisms may be circulating more commonly in the world due to international travel, to link it with the safety of surgery hospitals in India and citing isolated examples to show that India is not a safe place to visit due to the presence of such organism in Indian environment are wrong,” V.M. Katoch, Director-General, Indian Council of Medical Research, said.
Several authors had declared a conflict of interest in the publication of the study. The study was funded by the European Union and two pharmaceutical companies — Wellcome Trust and Wyeth — that produce antibiotics for treatment of such cases, the statement said.
The government also strongly objected to the naming of this enzyme as New Delhi metallo beta lactamase -1 (NDM-1) and refuted the conclusion that hospitals in India were not safe for treatment.
Though not disputing the validity of the study, he said the conclusions were “unfair” and “scary.” The conclusions and interpretations of the study were wrong, scientifically invalid and aimed at creating a scare.
Madras University’s Karthikeyan Kumarasamy from Erode had his elation set back slightly at the interpretation the media had given his article. “That it was transmitted from India is hypothetical. Unless we analyse samples from across the world to confirm its presence, we can only speculate,” he said.
Researchers crack open secret of superbug’s resistance
Scientists have stumbled upon a central processing unit (CPU) of a superbug’s weaponry which will provide new options to fight back and disable the virulent bacteria.
A team from the McMaster University’s Institute for Infectious Disease Research has revealed that a small chemical, made by the superbug Staphylococcus aureus and its drug-resistant forms, determines this disease’s strength and ability to infect.
The bacteria are the cause for a wide range of difficult-to-treat human infectious diseases such as pneumonia, toxic-shock syndrome and flesh-eating diseases. It is known as the superbug as it has become increasingly resistant to antibiotics and especially troublesome in hospitals.
“We’ve found that when these small chemicals in the bacteria are shut down, the bacteria is rendered non-functional and non-infectious,” said Nathan Magarvey, principal study investigator and assistant professor of biochemistry at McMaster. “We’re now set on hacking into this pathogen and making its system crash.” These findings appeared in Science.
To identify these “pathogen small molecule CPUs”, the researchers used cutting-edge chemical mining tools to reveal the molecular wiring associated with their formation.
Then, to uncover its function, the McMaster scientists shut off its synthesis, showing that the deadly pathogens had been tamed and were unable to burst open red blood cells, said a McMaster’s statement.
Cell to keep record of hospital-acquired infections soon
India is working to set up a cell that will issue guidelines and keep a record of hospital-acquired infections,” V.M. Katoch, Director-General of the Indian Council of Medical Research, said in New Delhi on 12.08.2010. As of now, India did not have any rules to check hospital-acquired infections.
Superbug threat – The Hindu Editorial on 16.08.2010
Gram-negative Enterobacteriaceae strains resistant to carbapenem, a powerful antibiotic, and one of the last lines of treatment for infections caused by Gram-negative bacteria, are becoming more widespread in India. The resistance arises on account of a new gene that codes for metallo-beta-lactamase enzyme.
The drug-resistant bacterial gene, the so-called superbug, was named New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase-1 (NDM-1) in 2009 when it was first identified in a Swedish person admitted to a hospital in New Delhi.
A study, reported online in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, (“Emergence of a new antibiotic resistant mechanism in India, Pakistan, and the UK: a molecular, biological, and epidemiological study,” by Karthikeyan K. Kumarasamy et al.) found that apart from several locations in India, the carbapenem-resistant strain was seen in 37 U.K. patients who had undergone elective and cosmetic surgery in India and two neighbouring countries.
According to a study published in March, 2010 in the Journal of Association of Physicians of India (JAPI), 22 cases of carbapenem-resistant NDM-1 were collected within three months from a Mumbai hospital. The spread and increasing numbers come as no surprise as the drug is overused.
Resistance to extended-spectrum beta-lactamases (ESBL) drugs like third-generation cephalsporins is between 60 and 70 per cent on average in India, compared with less than 15 per cent seen in many developed countries. A common way of treating the severe form of ESBL infections is the use of carbapenem — which becomes the drug of choice as it has the lowest resistance rates and the broadest action against Gram-negative infections.
Inappropriate and indiscriminate use of carbapenem, a reserved antibiotic, has played a major role in the development of the carbapenem-resistant gene, including the new NDM-1 strain.
From being absent a few years ago, NDM-1 is beginning to show up. Unlike ESBL, which has become a community infection, NDM-1 is, in all probability, still a hospital-acquired infection. Drug-resistant NDM-1 strains are being seen only now but they are a cause for worry because only a few drugs are available to treat Gram-negative infections. The prevalence can increase within a relatively short time, since the NDM-1 gene is carried in the plasmids of the Gram-negative bacteria. These plasmids can move from one bacterium to another, and even to different species.
There is still a good chance of keeping the prevalence low, provided a two-pronged approach is adopted: instituting a national antibiotic policy that restricts the use of carbapenem and other higher-end antibiotics to hospital settings and only for patients with severe infections, and having a national registry of drug-resistant strains.
WHO endorses superbug study findings – 21.08.2010
Even as the controversy over the origin of the new antibiotic-resistant bacteria named after India — New Delhi Metallo-beta lactamase-1 (NDM-1) — continues, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has virtually endorsed the study published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal saying that the article had drawn attention to the issue of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), and, in particular, raised the awareness of infections caused by multi-drug resistant bacteria.
In a statement issued on 21.08.2010, the WHO said that while multi-drug resistant bacteria are not new and will continue to appear, this development requires monitoring and further study to understand the extent and modes of transmission, and to define the most effective measures for control.
AMR will be the theme of the WHO’s World Health Day 2011.
The 2010 Mumbai oil spill occurred after two Panamian-flagged ships, MSC Chitra and MV Khalijia-III collided off the coast of India near time. MSC Chitra, which was outborne Mumbai on 7.08.2010 at around 9:50 A.M local time from South Mumbai’s Nava Sheva port collided with the inbound MV Khalijia-III which immediately threw out the oil containers from MSC Chitra into the Arabian Sea. Khalijia-III was apparently involved with another mishap on July 18, 2010.
MSC Chitra, registered in Panama, is owned by Mediterranean Shipping Company, a public limited company based in Geneva, Switzerland. Its management operations are conducted from Hong Kong, while its local agents in Mumbai look after the loading and unloading of its ships. “It’s a big shipping company owing 140 ships,” Mr. Khalid said.
Khalijia, on the other hand, is owned by Gulf Rock KSC, a Kuwait-based public limited company, with management operations in Navi Mumbai. The company is listed on the Kuwait Stock Exchange.
When the MSC Chitra collided with the Khalijia on 7.08.2010, it had a cargo of 1,219 containers holding 2662 tonnes of fuel, 283 tonnes of diesel and 88040 litres of lubricant oil. Thirty-one containers had pesticide in them. The Chitra tilted sharply under the impact of the collision, resulting in the oil spill and now, containers of pesticide bobbing off on the sea.
The foreign cargo ship, which collided with another vessel about 10 km off Mumbai harbour, tilted further spilling oil for the third day continuously as Navy and Coast Guard made hectic efforts to contain the leak. The Chief Minister of Maharashtra, Thiru Ashok Chavan claimed that they have already filed cases against the captains of the two ships which are from abroad. Thirty three crew members, including two Pakistanis, were rescued following the incident.
“The oil slick has been sighted on shore from Nariman Point to Cuffe Parade in Mumbai, Vashi and Airoli in Thane district, Uran, Mandovi and Elephanta in Raigad district. Elephanta and Navi Mumbai or BARC [Bhabha Atomic Research Centre] are reportedly the only sites where mangroves have been indicated to be affected. The Pollution Control Board has constituted four survey teams with assistance of the Coast Guard and the district or local administration, one each for Mumbai, Mumbai suburban, Thane and Raigad districts,” a press note of the Directorate General (DG) of Shipping said.
The Navy and the Coast Guards have been carrying out anti-pollution operations every day to check and neutralise the oil spill. Six coastguard vessels and a helicopter with anti-pollution dispersal spray systems were pressed into service on 8th August 2010 to contain the oil spill.
A high-level meeting, attended by the officials of the Maharashtra Government Environment Department, National Disaster Response Force, Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation, Shipping department, Mumbai Port Trust and other concerned agencies has been convened to assess the situation and steps to be taken to bring it under control, sources said.
Fishing associations have been also requested not to carry out any fishing activities till the oil spill is contained. Officials are yet to locate the leakage. The thick oil slick has been sighted two to three kms around the vessel Chitra. As on 10th Aug 2010, traffic had been suspended as the containers were still sighted floating into the channel thus making navigation hazardous.
The Directorate General of Shipping has initiated an investigation into the incident, Directorate General of Shipping’s Chief Nautical Advisor M M Savvi said, adding that the Coast Guard and senior officials (Directorate General of Shipping) were at the site.
On 10th August the oil slick from MSC Chitra stopped. Officials claim that no oil was coming out. Operation is halted as the ship is steady. Evacuation of cargo was supposed to start from 11th August 2010.
But MSC Chitra is still tilted dangerously and there is no change in situation. The oil patches off middle ground and islands of Elephanta and butcher have been cleared off. The district collectors of Thane, Navi Mumbai and Raigarh have reported no sighting of oil on coast line. Pollution response capable vessels are spraying oil spill dispersants.
During aerial surveillance concentrated residual oil patches have been sighted adjoining areas of BARC and Sewri. Around 800 tonnes of oil is floating on the sea comes dangerously close to the coast line.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has intervened and asked for a report from the Union Shipping Ministry on the oil spill. Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) has also been alerted by the Coastguard to stop using sea water for cooling down purposes as the slick has reached Sewree area where BARC is located. Hectic efforts continued to combat the oil spill spanning around two miles in the Arabian Sea.
In the biggest such operation mounted so far in the Indian sea waters, authorities have deployed five Indian Coast Guard (ICG) ships, one helicopter and one small aircraft for controlling the massive oil spill. The ships ICG Sankalp, Amrit Kaur, Subhadra Kumari Chauhan, Kamla Devi and C-145 – have joined the ICG AOPV Sangram, which was deployed since 9th August 2010 to monitor the oil spill and guide relief efforts. A Chetak helicopter and a small Dornier aircraft were pressed into service for aerial spray of dispersants to tackle the thick oil slick.
August 11th 2010
The Singapore-based Smit Company will begin operations to salvage the MSC Chitra from August 11th 2010. But it may take nearly six to eight months before the ship can be removed from the spot. Mumbai Port Trust chairperson Rahul Asthana says that a team has come on 10th August 2010 and another is reaching on 11th August 2010 morning with pumps to remove the oil.
Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust’s acting chairperson N N Kumar said these pumps can suck out oil at the rate of 30 metric tonnes an hour. The ship Chitra was carrying 2662 metric tonnes of fuel when it started. Nearly 879 metric tonnes has flown out. Besides, there are 283.8 tonnes of diesel and 88,040 litres of lube oil on board. It is expected to take eight days to drain out the oil.
Coast Guard officials said a crane called Sea Patriot C4 mounted on a ship has been arranged and has been positioned close to Chitra to continuously pump out the oil.
The salvers have already placed tugs and put chains so that the falling containers do not drift far off. They are immediately picked up and kept on the tugs. Asthana said the equipment is being imported from Rotterdam and Singapore.
The submerged containers will be lifted using air bags and towed to a shallow corner. Simultaneously, the containers on the ship will be removed with a crane, placed on a barge and then taken to JNPT.
N. N Kumar also said around the same time, water will be filled in the ship’s tanks so that she does not lose her balance. Water blasts will also be used to correct the balance. But Kumar says that the major fear will be over when the oil is removed completely. It will take six to eight months before the ship can be refloated and towed away. If the salvers cannot refloat her, then they will have to cut her and dismantle her.
Impact of the Mumbai Oil Spill
The situation is chilling. A snake which came in from the sea was covered in oil and chemicals and was struggling. Neither could it go back into the sea as it is filled with oil, nor could it remain in the open in the baking sun. The oil spill has turned deadly. And it’s not just this one snake.
Fishermen claim that their fishing nets in the sea are all covered with oil. No one is willing to buy such fish. The marine life here is contaminated. This has been confirmed by initial reports carried out by the state government. The oil slick has even entered the sensitive mangrove belt. While the government is working towards a swift clean up, environmentalists fear it may be too late.
Environmentalists worry that the oil slick will enter the mangroves and mudflats and once that happens nothing can be done to clean it up. Moreover he believes that India has the technology or the intent.
The Environment Minister Thiru Jairam Ramesh claims that removing the entire oil from the sea will take 45 days. Comprehensive detailed investigation on damage on mangrove forest will be done by Maharashtra Pollution Board. And while the leak may have been plugged, going by the extent to which the slick has spread, it will be a while before the villagers can return to the seas for their livelihood.
As the crisis related to the oil spill off Mumbai coast becomes bigger, it’s business as usual in the metropolis. Even as mangroves turn black due to the oil slick and toxic chemical bottles get washed ashore, at the Mumbai docks fish continues to be brought in and hundreds of fishermen continue to go out to sea.
Over 31 containers with hazardous chemicals are still missing and need to be found. Debris can still be seen floating in the waters. The water around the damaged MSC Chitra is clear but that is because the ship is in deep sea and the debris is getting washed ashore.
But the fishermen claim there is no need to panic. They are worried people will stop eating fish, affecting their business in turn.
12th August 2010
The crisis related to the oil spill off Mumbai coast becomes bigger.. Even as mangroves turn black due to the oil slick and toxic chemical bottles get washed ashore, at the Mumbai docks fish continues to be brought in and hundreds of fishermen continue to go out to sea.
Over 31 containers with hazardous chemicals are still missing and need to be found. Debris can still be seen floating in the waters. The water around the damaged MSC Chitra is clear but that is because the ship is in deep sea and the debris is getting washed ashore.
But the fishermen claim there is no need to panic. They are worried people will stop eating fish, affecting their business in turn. They claim that there is no connection between the oil spill and fish.
Despite the warnings of the state government and Environment Ministry for the fisherman of Mumbai it is business as usual. They insist there is nothing wrong. For them it is just another day.
Loss due to spill
Four billion dollar of trade will be lost if the oil spill off the Mumbai coast is not dealt with by the weekend. The situation has already prompted exporters and importers to ask the government for financial relief,.
The recent oil spill off the Mumbai coast has disrupted cargo traffic at JNPT and Mumbai port. And if the situation is not addressed by the end of the week (15th august 2010), the Federation of Indian Export Organizations (FIEO) estimates that USD 4 billion of trade cargo will be lost.
After all, these two ports handle 60% of India’s container traffic. The FIEO says that losses are mounting with each day of delay. It pegs losses to Indian importers and exporters at USD 20 million by the end of the week. The Federation is now asking the government to help contain these financial losses by waiving demurrage, detention and other charges which arise from suspension of operations at the ports.
Oil companies, meanwhile, are putting on a brave face, for now. They say that fuel production at their Mumbai plants are normal, and add that the port disruption will not mean a shortage of supplies, for the time being. ONGC is also working to compensate for the blocked ports by diverting crude to its two facilities through pipeline.
This measure, it says, will ensure supplies are not impaired. Officials at oil marketing companies IOC, BPCL and HPCL agree, saying they have enough inventories to survive this crisis.
The Maharashtra government is going all out to assure the people that port activities will resume as soon as possible. But experts point out that if port operations remain suspended past the 15th of august, Mumbai could run out of fuel.
The Response System
The collision of two large ships off the Mumbai coast and the resulting oil spill has come as a test of India’s preparedness to handle shipping disasters. A strong oil spill response system is of paramount importance. Yet capacity-building efforts in major ports have not kept pace with the need.
It is precisely to meet such challenges that a National Oil Spill Disaster Contingency Plan (NOS-DCP) was drawn up in 1996. Based on this, all ports should by now possess functional spill response systems but they clearly do not. The proceedings of the 14th NOS-DCP and Preparedness Meeting held in 2009 highlighted the slow progress in achieving full response capacity even at the basic level at Mumbai and JNPT ports.
India has ratified key environmental and shipping conventions, including the International Convention on Oil Pollution Preparedness, Response and Cooperation. The national coastline is about 7,500 km long and has, in the assessment of the Coast Guard (CG), 11 major and 20 minor ports that must be equipped to combat oil pollution. A few ships sink in Indian coastal waters every year; in 2007, as many as five vessels with a total of 658 tonnes of oil went down.
Captain Martin and Master Laxman Dubey of MV Kahlijia III have been booked under IPC sections 280 [rash navigation] and 336 (act endangering life or personal safety of others) and sections 7, 8, 9 pertaining to prevention, control and abatement of environmental pollution of the Environment Protection Act.
As India and Pakistan move towards the welcome resumption of dialogue, New Delhi needs to factor in a new reality: More than Kashmir, it is the accusation that India is stealing water that is rapidly becoming the “core issue” in the Pakistani establishment’s narrative about bilateral problems.
Concern is growing in Pakistan that India is pursuing policies in an attempt to strangulate Pakistan by exercising control over the water flow of Pakistan’s rivers. The concern is most related to Pakistan’s agricultural sector, which would be greatly affected by the building of dams and by the external control of the waters of several rivers that flow into Pakistan. The issue has a layered complexity, as three of the rivers flow into Pakistan through the Indian portion of Jammu & Kashmir, the territory over which the two countries have waged multiple wars.
A group of more than 20 different UN bodies warned earlier this month that the world may be perilously close to its first water war. “Water is linked to the crises of climate change, energy and food supplies and prices, and troubled financial markets,” said the report. “Unless their links with water are addressed and water crises around the world are resolved, these other crises may intensify and local water crises may worsen, converging into a global water crisis and leading to political insecurity and conflict at various levels.”
With the per capita availability of water declining in Pakistan due to rising population and poor water management, there is a sense of an imminent water crisis. The problems are plenty-
Groundwater is said to be under stress through over-exploitation
River flows are reported to be diminishing
Some rivers to be so polluted as to be no more than sewers
Water supply in cities is reportedly intermittent and unreliable
In most years, the Indus barely makes it beyond the Kotri barrage in Sindh, leading to the ingress of sea water, the increase in soil salinity and the destruction of agriculture in deltaic districts like Thatta and Badin.
While this appears to be an internal problem in Pakistan, the popular refrain in the country seems to be that India is behind the problem. This is being echoed in the media, picked up by the jihadists, and acquiesced in at the official and expert levels through silence (or even aggravated by official statements). This is a new development. Until recently, there were criticisms of particular Indian projects on the western rivers as not compliant with the Treaty, but no accusations of ‘water theft’ by India.
Though Pakistan’s water woes predate recent hydroelectric projects like Baglihar in Jammu and Kashmir, jihadi organisations like the Lashkar-e-Taiba/Jamaat-ud-Dawa have started blaming India for the growing shortage of water. Apart from inflaming public opinion against India, this propaganda helps to blunt the resentment Sindh and Balochistan have traditionally had — as the lowest riparians in the Indus river basin — against West Punjab for drawing more than its fair share of the water flowing through the provinces.
Pakistan blames India, saying it is withholding millions of cubic feet of water upstream on the Chenab in Indian-administered Kashmir and storing it in the massive Baglihar dam in order to produce hydro-electricity. Its Indian neighbour, Pakistan declares, is in breach of a 1960 treaty designed to administer water use in the region. After initial talks to try and resolve the issue, the matter has been put on hold since the Mumbai attacks last November in which 165 people were killed, fuelling tensions between the two quarrelsome neighbours.
How did this accusation come about? The answer is that some studies reportedly indicate a reduction in the flows in the western rivers, and it seems to be readily assumed that if the flows show a reduction, the upper riparian must have reduced them. India would say that if there are reductions in flows, they cannot forthwith be attributed to Indian action.
Also, Pakistan continues to be uncomfortable about Indian projects on the western rivers despite the many stringent safeguards provided by the Treaty to protect Pakistan against certain perceived dangers. Pakistan wants the Treaty to give the exclusive use of the western rivers with no provision whatever for even limited use by India; but such a Treaty might not have been signed by India. But, what with the permissive and restrictive provisions in the Treaty, and the density of technical detail in it, the situation in the Permanent Indus Commission (PIC) has turned adverse, leading to a constant tug of war, instead of constructive cooperation.
Also Pakistan is worried about the number of projects that India is planning on the western rivers. This is because, even with strict compliance with the provisions of the Treaty in each case, India might, taking all the projects together, acquire a measure of control over the waters of the western rivers and might potentially be able to inflict harm on Pakistan.
Pakistan believes that India might be planning a hundred projects. There seems to be no basis for that number. It is more likely that India might have in mind some thirty projects or so. It is not clear whether all those projects will in fact be undertaken, but assuming that they are, it is necessary to consider whether all of them will together give India a greater degree of control; enable large storage; make it possible for India to withhold water from Pakistan, or release stored waters and flood Pakistan. India claims that most of these will be small projects, which are run-of-the-river projects. Given the restrictive provisions of the Treaty, there is hardly any scope either for the retention of waters to the detriment of the lower riparian or for flooding the lower riparian; and that assuming that India wants to harm Pakistan it can do so only by openly violating the Treaty and by first harming itself, its own people, and its own projects (built at great cost).
Islamabad should also not doubt India’s plan to put up projects that do not impede water flows on the western rivers, because Article III of the IWT allows it the use of western river waters for domestic, non-consumptive and agriculture purposes, besides the generation of electricity.
Though the treaty has a mechanism to ensure compliance with the stipulated partitioning of rivers, a major weakness from Pakistan’s standpoint is that it does not compel or require India to do anything on its side for the optimum development of what is, after all, an integrated water system. Inflows to Pakistan depend not just on rainfall and snowmelt in India and China (the uppermost eastern riparian) but also on the health of tributaries, streams, nullahs and acquifers as well as groundwater, soil and forest management practices. This is a classic externality problem. Costs incurred by the upper riparian on responsible watershed management will produce disproportionate benefits for the lower riparian, hence they are not incurred.
Under the treaty, India is allowed to store 3.6 million acreage feet (MAF) of water of the western rivers, but it has not built any such facility so far, allowing unimpeded flows into Pakistan. Since the water level in the Chenab varies wildly during winter and summer, a better strategy would be for both countries to build a joint storage project which would serve the farmers of both countries during the lean periods, some experts aver.
Pakistan might consider the following two points as harmful.
The initial filling of the Baglihar reservoir, and
The planned diversion of Kishenganga waters
The first was a very minor and relatively innocuous matter which was blown up into a huge controversy. The issue has been closed at the last meeting of the PIC. The Kishenganga diversion, which Pakistan considers to be a violation of the Treaty and India holds to be specifically permitted by the Treaty, is going to the Court of Arbitration.
The fact that river flows from India to Pakistan have slowly declined is borne out by data on both sides. Above Merala on the Chenab, for example, the average monthly flows for September have nearly halved between 1999 and 2009. India claims that this is because of reduced rainfall and snowmelt. Pakistan refutes, preferring to link observable reductions in flows to hydroelectric projects on the Indian side. That is why, in the run-up to the February 25 meeting of the Indian and Pakistani Foreign Secretaries, Islamabad has gone out of its way to project water as the most important topic it intends to raise.
The reality of the partition
Though inter-provincial disputes over water sharing were a fact of life in this region before 1947, the partition of the subcontinent introduced a further complexity. It was easy for Radcliffe to draw a line on a map and divide up the land of British India but people and water were harder to partition. The rupture to the region’s hydrological system proved to be traumatic. The rivers which irrigated the new nation all had their origins in India. But as an upper riparian locked in a politically adversarial relationship with Pakistan, the Indian side had little or no incentive to look at the Indus basin as an integrated water system. The early years of independence saw bitter disputes as India treated the waters of the Indus’s five tributaries — Jhelum, Chenab, Ravi, Beas and Sutlej — as its own. Geography and terrain meant the Indus itself could not be harnessed on the Indian side of Jammu and Kashmir but intermittent, small-scale, diversions on the tributaries generated considerable tension with Pakistan. In 1960, the two countries sought to put an end to this tension by signing the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) with the World Bank’s mediation.
The IWT partitioned the six rivers of the Indus watershed on a crudely longitudinal basis. India was given exclusive use of the waters of the three eastern tributaries, the Ravi, Beas and Sutlej, and the right to “non-consumptive” use of the western rivers, namely the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab. Under the IWT, India renounced its right to block or divert the flows of the ‘western’ rivers and agreed to confine itself to run-of-the-river hydroelectric projects and the drawing of irrigation water for a specified acreage of farm land. This partitioning was irrational from an ecological standpoint and led to both sides incurring considerable expense as they were forced to develop canal infrastructure drawing on “their” allocated rivers to compensate for the non-use of the other side’s rivers despite that water flowing through their own territory.
Pakistani officials keep accusing India of violating the 1960 treaty on the division of the Indus waters. The Indian side, of course, denies this, and there is, in any case, a system of international mediation built into the IWT for binding international arbitration if the two countries cannot resolve a water-related dispute. Pakistan invoked this mechanism for Baglihar in 2005, though the arbitrator ruled in favour of the project subject to certain modifications. An earlier dispute over the Salal project was resolved in the 1970s by the two Foreign Secretaries.
Many of the disputes that seem to be driven by fears of water scarcity are actually a reflection of another kind of scarcity: electricity. Pakistan opposes the Indian Kishenganga hydel project on the Jhelum, for example, because it will interfere with its proposed Neelum-Jhelum power plant. But if the two countries could build trust in one another, there is no reason why they cannot agree on energy swaps that could do away with the need to duplicate power projects, especially those which restrict the flow of water. Today, given the way terrorism has eroded the Indian political system’s capacity and willingness to do business with Pakistan, such ideas seem hopelessly utopian. But they do offer a glimpse of the kind of future that might be possible should the terrorist menace end. Rather than refusing to talk water, India should show Pakistan how the keys to ending its aquatic insecurities lie in its own hands.
In fact, Islamabad’s desire to bring the water issue on the table on the eve of this week’s foreign secretary talks is a change from its stand in 2002, when the “Pakistan Water Sector Strategy” argued for thwarting any “attempt by India” to scrap the treaty. It anticipated an adverse impact on the river water flows if the treaty was scrapped and argued for building storage capacities to meet requirements in times of shortages, which Pakistan has failed to do adequately.
Silting at dams
Pakistan’s problems are compounded by silting at the Tarbela and Mangla dams, with an internal official assessment admitting that it has lost 32 per cent of its storage capacity due to the problem.
While framing the IWT, the irrigable area of India and Pakistan was assessed at 26 million acres and 39 million acres respectively, while the waters available to them are 32.8 MAF and 135.6 MAF respectively. This means that only about 1.26 feet of water is available to India for its agriculture on eastern rivers, while about 3.5 feet of water is available to Pakistan for its agriculture.
Unused water
Pakistan has a large surplus of unused water. Its documents show about 30 MAF as “available surplus” with a very high escapage to the sea. Pakistan’s irrigation efficiency is also understood to be low, at an estimated 40 per cent. Virtually all of the municipal and industrial wastewater is returned to the rivers, nullahs and streams untreated, which results in deterioration of water quality.
The Pakistan document also suggests that canal capacities are not sufficient to provide the share of each province as per their allocation. The inefficient system aggravates the problems.
As a result of the IWT, Pakistan was assisted by India financially (£62.06 million) and by the IBRD fund to build replacement works, including link canals for transferring waters of the western rivers to eastern rivers. This network of link canals could be used by Pakistan to properly distribute the water.
Pakistan believes that the diversion of Neelum waters is not allowed under the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty, as it will cause a 27 per cent water deficit, when the project is completed. The reduced water flow in the Neelum would not yield the required results of the proposed 1.6 billion dollars Neelum-Jehlum hydropower project that has been designed to generate 969 MW of electricity. It said that India has almost completed a 22-kilometre long tunnel to divert Kishanganga waters to Wullar Lake in Jammu and Kashmir.
President Obama’s Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke has said Washington is in consultations with India and Pakistan to help both countries resolve water disputes between them.
In an interview with a private television channel, Holbrooke termed Pakistan’s water crisis as the second most worry for that country after its sagging economy. “Pakistan’s water crisis is the second most dangerous crisis after its economic turmoil,” The Daily Times quoted Holbrooke, as saying.
The Indus Waters Treaty (IWT), inked between India and Pakistan in 1960, provides appointment of a neutral expert by the World Bank as a last option to resolve water related issues between both the countries.
Unless both countries can arrive at a compromise where the dispute is concerned, analysts fear that this problem might lead to a terrible Indo – Pakistan war.
Tejaswini Sawant, won Gold at World Championships and has created history as she is the first Indian woman shooter to win a gold medal at the World Championships. Tejaswini Sawant has won Gold in 50m Rifle Prone event with a world-record equalling score at Munich, Germany where the World Championships are being held.
Tejaswini Sawant (born: 12 September 1980) is an Indian shooter from the Maharashtrian city of Kolhapur.
Tejaswini Sawant scripted history on 8.08.2010 by becoming the first Indian woman shooter to clinch a gold medal at the World Championships with a world-record equalling score in the 50m Rifle Prone event in Munich, Germany.Sawant shot a score of 597 (100,100,100,99,99,99), equalling the 1998 record set by Marina Bobkova of Russia.
Tejaswini arrived on the shooting scene in 1999 when she was adjudged the best shooter of the NCC 6 Maharashtra Girls Battalion. But the defining moment came in 2001, when Tejaswini finished 5th in the Mavlankar Championship at Asansol.
Sawant represented India at the 9th South Asian Sports Federation Games in 2004 in Islamabad where she helped India win gold medal. She was selected to represent India at Commonwealth Games ahead of Asian Games gold medallist Anjali Ved Pathak Bhagwat and world record holder Suma Shirur after winning 5 gold medals, 6 silver medals and 5 bronze medals at the national championships. In 2006, she won gold medals in Women’s 10m Air Rifle singles and Women’s 10m Air Rifle Pairs (with Avneet Kaur Sidhu) events at the Commonwealth Games at Melbourne. Sawant won a bronze medal in 50 metre rifle three positions at the 2009 ISSF World Cup in Munich. On 8 August 2010 she became the World Champion in the 50m Rifle Prone event in Munich, Germany. She was the first Indian woman shooter to win a gold medal at the World Championships with a world-record equalling score in the 50m Rifle Prone event
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has congratulated Tejaswini Sawant on becoming the first Indian woman shooter to clinch a gold medal at the World Championships in Munich, Germany. In a message, Singh said her outstanding performance has brought laurels to the nation and her achievement will inspire other youngsters to do their best for the country.
Maharashtra Government on 9.08.2010 announced a cash prize of Rs five lakh to Tejaswini Sawant for winning a gold medal in the 50 metre rifle shooting prone category at the World Shooting Championships held in Munich, Germany.
The Municipal Corporation of Pune on 10.08.2010 felicitated ace woman shooter Tejaswini Sawant on winning a gold medal in the 50-metre rifle category at the World Shooting Championship held in Munich, Germany. On behalf of the Corporation, Pune Mayor Mohan Singh Rajpal presented a shawl and a cheque of Rs one lakh to Sawant.
Maharashtra governor K Sankaranarayanan has congratulated Tejaswini Sawant for winning the gold medal at the World Shooting Championships held in Munich. In a congratulatory message to Tejaswini, the governor said she did the nation proud by striking a Gold at the World Shooting Championships held in Germany. “You have had a brilliant record at the Commonwealth Games held in 2006 and the nation has great expectations from you for the forthcoming Commonwealth Games in Delhi and the Asian Games in China,” he said. “The people of Maharashtra are rightly enthused by your world record equalling feat. I congratulate you and wish you glorious success in your future career,” he said.
In a landmark resolution, the United Nations General Assembly has recognised access to clean water and sanitation as a human right. The 39-state proposal, initiated by Bolivian President Evo Morales, was passed by 122 votes to zero, with 41 member states abstaining.
The negotiations leading to the vote, however, were detailed and tense, and showed clear political divisions on North-South lines. The major opposition came from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Japan and several other industrialised countries together with developing countries known for siding with the U.S. and former colonial powers.
Indeed, had Germany and Spain not stated that they would not oppose the resolution, opponents such as the U.K. and Sweden may even have succeeded in conveying the impression that the European Union as a whole had achieved a consensus against it. Some delegations, implausibly in this electronic age, said they did not receive their governments’ instructions in time for the vote. Campaigning groups have also said that an attempt was made within the U.N. to derail the resolution, in the form of a prior letter sent by the U.N. Secretary General’s Advisory Board to the President of the General Assembly suggesting alterations to the draft resolution; some have implied that this constituted an attempt to impose a neoliberal tone on the draft.
The fact remains, nevertheless, that nearly 900 million people lack access to safe drinking water; nearly two billion people live in water-stressed areas around the world, and three billion live a kilometre or more away from the nearest running water. Over 2.6 billion lack access to basic sanitation, and 1.5 million children under five die every year because of contaminated water or poor sanitation.
Writing in The New York Times, Mikhail Gorbachev calls the situation “water apartheid,” and notes that since the end of World War II contaminated water has killed more people than all forms of violence combined.
As to major diseases, AIDS, malaria, and measles together do not account for as many deaths as impure water does. The U.N. resolution is non-binding, but it has been hailed as a decisive move in the worldwide struggle for access to safe water as essential to human survival and dignity. Although the vote in the General Assembly has shown political cleavages, the passage of the resolution is a tribute to the tireless work of water-rights NGOs such as the Canada-based Blue Planet Project and to those Latin American states which, having learnt by bitter experience what neoliberalism means in practice, are leading the way towards significant alternatives.
The contentious Babhali Barrage issue, now at the centre of a controversy between Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, is scheduled to come up for further hearing before the Supreme Court in August 2010. Though the Maharashtra government was permitted by the apex court in April 2007 to go ahead with the construction of the Babhali Barrage, it has been restrained from installing 13 gates on it till further orders.
Maharashtra believes that they are strictly honouring the Godavari Water Disputes Tribunal (GWDT) award of 1975 and following the apex court directives by not impounding the water.
The Controversy
The Babhali Barrage is being constructed on the Godavari, around 80 km from Nanded, the home district of Chief Minister Ashok Chavan of Maharashtra. Situated within the Maharashtra boundary, the barrage is seven kilometres upstream from the state border at the confluence of the Godavari and Manjra rivers. With a storage capacity of 2.75 million cubic feet, the barrage will cater to the drinking water requirements of 58 surrounding villages and irrigate 7,995 hectares of agricultural land. The total cost of the barrage (as per revised estimates) would be around Rs.2.21 billion and the state has already spent Rs.1.6 billion on the project.
Chavan said 80 percent of the work on the barrage is almost complete, including the approach roads on both sides of the project. Minor works like electrification for operating the barrage gates, constructing a generator room and inspection posts are currently under way.
Andhra Pradesh has claimed that the Babhali Barrage is being constructed within the backwaters of the Pochampad Dam in the Telangana region. It says Maharashtra is violating the GWDT agreement of October 1975, and challenged the matter in the Supreme Court.
It apprehends that the barrage would cut off water supply to the Pochampad Dam, adding to the woes of the farmers and create serious drinking water supply problems in the Telangana region.
Rejecting this strongly, the Maharashtra government has said that the barrage is being built seven kilometres upstream from the state border and within the state’s territory. They claim that they have prepared the schemes within the limits of the (water) share allotted by GWDT.
Chavan says that the state would not deprive Andhra Pradesh of even a drop of its due water share.
Arrest of TDP Chief
Andhra Pradesh’s opposition Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief N. Chandrababu Naidu, along with 74 supporters, in July 2010 entered Dharmabad town in Nanded district to examine the site of the Babhali Barrage over the Godavari river and ascertain whether Maharashtra was grabbing more than its share of water. They were arrested since they flouted prohibitory orders and remanded to judicial custody till July 26.
Even as they were being shifted from Dharmabad to Aurangabad, the Maharashtra government suddenly decided to drop all charges against Naidu and 65 others.
Instead of being taken to jail, they were driven straight to Chikhalthna Airport near Aurangabad and sent back to Hyderabad in a chartered Indian Airlines aircraft.
In the past few days, all political parties have described the TDP agitation as “a political stunt” to gain mileage in the July 27 by-elections in Telangana.
July 29, 2010
In order to discuss the row over the Babhali dam project between the riverine states, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had called a meeting of chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra on Aug 2, 2010. The meeting was aimed at addressing apprehensions among political parties in Andhra Pradesh, on Maharashtra not sticking to its commitment about the project following Supreme Court directions. Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister K. Rosaiah had led an all-party delegation to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and urged him to direct the Maharashtra government to dismantle the gates installed at the Babhali barrage and take necessary action to put an end to the dispute.
The delegation, which had representatives from all registered political parties in Andhra Pradesh, also urged the prime minister to call a meeting of the chief ministers of the two states to resolve the issue of Babhali barrage and 13 other barrages built on Godavari river, which flows through both states.
Political parties in Andhra Pradesh have accused Maharashtra of carrying out illegal construction on the Babhali barrage against a Supreme Court order, but Maharashtra denies it.
Aug 3, 2010
Chandrabau Naidu, the opposition leader told reporters that Rosaiah compromised the state’s interests during the meeting to save his “chair”. He pointed out that Maharashtra had already violated the Supreme Court’s interim order in the case by going ahead with the Babhali barrage across the Godavari. The Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief, who along with other party leaders was arrested by Maharashtra police recently for marching towards Babhali, wanted Rosaiah to reveal the details of the meeting.
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister K. Rosaiah denied that he compromised the interests of the state on the Babhali barrage dispute during a meeting with his Maharashtra counterpart in the presence of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. Addressing a news conference, he said Andhra Pradesh would continue to pursue the contempt of court case filed in the Supreme Court against Maharashtra for not abiding by its interim order.
He also claimed that at the same time the two states would continue their efforts to find a mutually acceptable solution to the problem. The chief minister said it was the opinion of the central government that both the states should abide by the Supreme Court order on the dispute.
Praja Rajyam Party (PRP) chief K. Chiranjeevi also said the meeting was not satisfactory. He too urged Rosaiah to call an all-party meeting and reveal the details of his discussions in Delhi. Andhra Pradesh argues that Babhali dam will deprive the state of its rightful share of Godavari waters.
Aug 5th 2010
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had convened a meeting of chief ministers of Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra over the Babhali barrage row and called upon the two riverine States to abide by the Supreme Court’s interim order.
The Lok Sabha was adjourned on Aug 4th 2010 for half-an-hour following protests by the members of the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) and the Shiva Sena over the Babhali dam dispute over the Godavari river. As the house convened at 11 a.m on 4.08.2010, the TDP members came near Speaker Meira Kumar’s podium shouting slogans over the issue. The enraged Shiv Sena members also started the protest, forcing the speaker to adjourn the house till 11.30 a.m.
The poorest State in India with an official estimate of 39.9 per cent of people living below the poverty line, yet Orissa stands proudly at the second position after Gujarat where proposed investment is concerned. According to Assocham Investment Meter, recorded investment proposals in Orissa reached Rs. 2,00,846 crore (roughly 40 billion USD) in 2009. The cause is the availability of rich mineral resources such as coal and iron ore along with cheap availability of manpower. Steel and power were among the sectors which attracted maximum proposed investments in the state. This was in fact the basis for the commencement of the Posco Project in Orissa which today is creating a huge controversy.
History of the Posco Project
23 June, 2005
On 23/06/2005, the global steel giant POSCO signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Government of Orissa in Bhubaneswar for the construction of a steel plant as well as development of iron ore mines in the state. This was the first step towards the construction of a steel plant in Orissa. The MoU was signed by Mr. Soung-Sik Cho, Executive Vice President of POSCO and Mr. Bhaskar Chatterjee, Principal Secretary of the Government of Orissa, with the participation of Mr. Ku-Taek Lee, Chairman and CEO of POSCO and Mr. Naveen Patnaik, Chief Minister of Orissa.
According to the MoU, POSCO will build a 3 million tonne capacity steel plant, blast furnace or Finex route, during the first phase in Paradeep, Orissa between 2007 and 2010 and expand the final production volume to 12 million tonnes. The investment proposed was to the tune of US$12 billion, including an initial investment of US$ 3 billion during the first phase.
The Government of Orissa was supposed to grant POSCO mining lease rights for 30 years that would ensure an adequate supply of 600 million tonnes of iron ore to POSCO. This in turn will ensure the competitive operations of the POSCO India steel plant. The government will also promote the construction plan for railways, roads, industrial water and electricity keeping up with the steelwork construction plan of POSCO.
The key factors that have been taken into account by POSCO for entering India include the highest projected growth rates over 2006-2020, the skilled workforce and abundant natural resources, especially of iron ore, coal and chrome. The Indian governments progressive policies have also helped ease regulations to set up such projects.
India would derive significant benefits from the project once it is functional, including job creation of 48,000 jobs in the region and 467,000 man years of employment during the construction phase. Foreign exchange inflows of US$23 billion were projected, with taxes and royalty incomes of US$20.3 billion for the central government and US$5.1 billion for the Orissa government.
POSCO’s Indian steel plant project is a significant part of the company’s strategy to enhance its global competitiveness and was seen as a mutual win-win initiative for both the parties involved.
Origin of Posco
Founded in 1968 and headquartered in the southeastern port city of Pohang, POSCO operates two of the world’s premier steel works–the Pohang and Gwangyang works. The Pohang works produces crude steel of 13 million tonnes and specializes in small-lot production of a broad range of products, including hot-rolled coil and cold-rolled sheet, plate, wire rod, electrical steel, and stainless steel. The Gwangyang works focuses on mass-production of limited high-demand products such as hot and cold rolled sheet and produces crude steel of 17 million tonnes. POSCO’s products are shipped to over 60 countries around the globe, satisfying some of the world’s most quality-sensitive customers.
POSCO project
The $12 billion Pohang Iron and Steel Company (POSCO) project in Orissa is the largest foreign investment project ever in India. This project has three components:
Captive iron ore mines in three areas of Keonjhar District and Sundargarh District.
Mining lease on 6204 Hectares in Sundargarh District recommended to be approved by the Supreme Court.
Steel plant: in Jagatsinghpur District, coastal area. Private port: at the mouth of the river Jatadhari, close to steel plant area; the MoU only makes reference to the possibility of a “minor port” being created.
POSCO needs some 4004 acres, of which but ten percent belong to the cultivators. The rest of the land required belongs to the government, and this has been recorded as “under forest” in official documentation. Government records do not show that the vast majority of this land has been under cultivation by the people living in these areas for generations
A field study in Orissa made found that during the land survey and settlement operation carried out in the late 1950s and continuing in the 1980s in some areas of Koraput district, hardly one per cent land in actual possession of the tribal communities was recorded in their favour.
Tribal cultivators are then termed “encroachers”, and their eviction from mineral rich forest and hill tracts follows “legally”. Much lauded statutory provisions that purport to give protection to indigenous forest dwellers are ignored (“interpreted”) by the relevant ministries to achieve the same result.
POSCO has delinked the mining project from the plant construction in order to get the vast project underway. A license for over 2,500 hectares for the proposed Khandadhar iron ore mines has been recommended by the Orissa State government, despite opposition from other companies and locals. But existing iron ore mining in the region has already severely impacted the water resources of a large region inhabited by many thousands. In the immediate region of the proposed mines the only constant water source are waterfalls that are already contaminated from iron mining with the result that the water is now not safe for drinking. In the larger surrounding region the Central Underground Water Board has reported that the underground water level in Joda and Barbil river areas has subsided by four metres, that forty percent of the region’s 8,000 tube wells no longer function, and that nearly half of the irrigated land can no longer rely on water from the Khandadhar waterfalls.
The POSCO project as a whole requires an immense impact on one of the last forested areas remaining in central India. Particular concern has been voiced over the State government’s commitment to “facilitate” the provision to POSCO of 7,000 crore liters of water per year for the plant alone from the very limited water resources of the draught ridden state.
But POSCO is not having a smooth run. The anti-POSCO movement is gearing up again against land acquisition. The POSCO struggle has now acquired strategic importance for other industries and corporate groups that face public agitation for destroying forests. This has added an extra dimension to anti-POSCO movement; caging the aspirations of agitators to basic minimum such as maintenance of status-quo or better compensation.
POSCO has not been able to initiate any project-related work on the ground. The forest clearance for POSCO was granted in December 2009. The Scheduled Tribes and Other Forest-Dwellers Recognition of Forest Rights Act, 2006 (henceforth, FRA) provides for settlement of rights by recognising the right of forest-dwellers to occupy, cultivate, use and protect areas within which they were residing before 13 December 2005. The rules for the Act were notified in January 2008. So, the forest clearance for the project could not have been granted till this process of filing claims and conferring rights was initiated and completed.
Since 30 July 2009, there has also been a circular of the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) in operation which also seeks the above, not just for POSCO but for all projects coming up before the MoEF for forest clearance, which states that the State/UT Governments, where process of settlement of Rights under the FRA is yet to begin, are required to enclose evidences supporting that settlement of rights under FRA 2006 will be initiated and completed before the final approval for proposals..
Nonetheless, within five months, the forest clearance for POSCO was granted without the FRA process in the area being complete. As compensation, the clearance letter included a condition that the processes under the FRA would need to be completed before the clearance became effective.
This and many other violations were brought to the attention of Jairam Ramesh, Minister of Environment and Forests (MoEF). The ministry responded by issuing another note on 8 January 2010 reiterating the condition stipulated in the forest clearance, which says that the rights of the tribal people will need to be settled, prior to the forest clearance being in operation.
The MoU stands expired on 22 June 2010. But the MoU has a clause which states that “no such extension shall be considered unless the Company has made substantial progress on implementation of the project in terms of construction, erection of plant and machinery and investment at site to the satisfaction of the State Government in these five years in implementing the first phase as envisaged in this MoU.”
According to the same document the first phase should have meant that 6 MT production of steel should have been commissioned, which has not happened. By the terms of the MoU, therefore, the absence of progress would imply that the MoU cannot be extended.
For the local opposition to the POSCO project, all these are legalese that will iron themselves out along the way. What matters crucially is that the people resisting remain united in thought and action. Despite differences and tension on the ground, the fact remains that POSCO has not been able to start work on its project for five years.
July 28th 2010
Shrugging off mounting opposition from the local people and objections from the Joint Committee under the Ministry of Environment and Forests, which is overseeing the implementation of the Forest Right Act (FRA), the Orissa government began the land acquisition process for the proposed Posco-India steel project in Jagatsinghpur district.
Revenue officials, flanked by a horde of police personnel, made the first real attempt to acquire land five years after the State government inked a Memorandum of Understanding with South Korean steel major Posco.
The locations of betel vines were documented using the Global Positioning System; the vines were subsequently removed in the presence of the owner and witnesses and the place was demarcated as ‘acquired.’ The administration paid Rs.1.15 lakh to the displaced person.
But the Orissa government halted the land acquisition process overnight for Posco’s Rs51,000 crore mega steel project near here after facing stiff opposition from villagers. Though the administration carried out land acquisition work and paid compensation to two betel leaf cultivators, the official team was prevented from entering Gada Kujang in the proposed project area as villagers blocked the main link road.
State agriculture minister Damodar Rout and Ersama-Balikuda MLA Prashant Kumar Muduli, along with the district collector, had rushed to Gada Kujung to speak to villagers.
They held a marathon meeting with the representatives of the pro-project United Action Committee (UAC) for facilitating the land acquisition process. UAC, the BJD-backed local body supporting the Posco project, is resisting land acquisition by the administration for not informing villagers.
Civil rights groups have accused the state government of knowingly violating norms under Forest Rights Acts and sought the intervention of Orissa high court chief justice.
CPI-backed Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS) is opposing land acquisition for the project.
Aug 03, 2010
Indian metals major Vedanta Aluminum and Korean steel behemoth Posco fear that their multi-billion projects may face inordinate delays after environment minister Jairam Ramesh told policymakers in Parliament on Aug 2nd 2010 that both firms violated forest laws. Ramesh also maintained that the two companies were under investigation in Orissa for violations.
Chief conservator of forests JK Tiwari’s inspection report of August 16, 2009, clarified that there was no violation of law. The report also stated that there were no environmental infringements. A three-member committee set up by environment ministry also concluded on February 11 2010 this year that there “was no mining or construction on the 660.749 hectares of land under question that was allotted to Vedanta”.
Similar was the tone and tenor of Posco officials who refused to accept that the company violated any law. A senior Posco official told Financial Chronicle that the minister was going against his own guidelines. Already, an environment ministry team led by environment activist Ashish Kothari has raised objections about the way clearances were accorded to the Posco project in the state. Yet another panel led by a retired official Meenu Gupta is examining how these alleged infringements had taken place.
Meanwhile, the Jagatsinghpur district administration has submitted its detailed report on socio-economic, forest and horticulture survey of the proposed Posco steel plant conducted in eight villages including the trouble torn Dhinkia village to state government. According to Posco officials, the report backed the company’s claims on the land
The survey teams collected data of betel vines, prawn gheris and other immovable assets without identification of beneficiaries. The number and area of prawn gheris, betel vines and other immovable assets have been included in this report.
In July 2010, Posco announced a compensation package for the people to be displaced by its Rs 51,000 crore mega steel project. The South Korean steel major would pay Rs 17 lakh per acre of agriculture land while the price of area under betel vine was fixed at Rs 11.5 lakh per acre.
Aug 4th 2010
The Orissa government resumed its global positioning system -based resurvey for the proposed Rs 54,000-crore Posco Steel Project near Paradip, following a three-day halt, after the United Action Committee (UAC), a pro-Posco outfit, agreed to lend support. Following state agriculture minister Damodar Rout and local legislator Prasant Muduli’s assurance to UAC members that after discussions with the state government, their demands would be fulfilled within next 10 days, they agreed to cooperate in the exercise.
Stop Posco project, Centre tells Orissa – 5.08.2010
In the latest hurdle to Posco’s embattled Rs.54,000-crore steel project in Orissa, the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests has told the State government to stop all work related to it, including land acquisition and handover, as it is violating the Forest Rights Act (FRA).
The August 5, 2010 order comes in the wake of a report by a committee set up jointly by the Environment and Tribal Affairs Ministries to assess the impact of the Act on sustainable forest resources management. A sub-group of the committee visited Orissa and found that “certain violations related to the Posco project were taking place as well.”
The Environment Ministry’s clearance for diversion of forest land for the project had stipulated that FRA implementation be completed first before any acquisition and handover. The committee found that the FRA process, to give land rights to the original forest dwellers, had still not even gone beyond the initial stages.
The State government has also failed to respond to the July 29, 2010 demand for urgent information on the land handover to Posco. Instead, the district administration seems to be proceeding with land acquisition from consenting families and demolition of paan cultivation, the order said. “The team’s conclusion is that any work related to the project in the area…is a violation of the FRA and of the conditionality laid down by the MoEF in its forest clearance,” the order said.
Conditional Green Clearance for Posco – 31.01.2011
After putting the project on hold last year, Union Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh on 31.01.2011 granted conditional clearance for South Korean major Posco’s $ 12 billion steel mill project in Orissa.
The Ministry, while granting conditional green clearance for steel-cum-captive-power plant and a captive minor port, however, sought Orissa Government’s assurances before it can give final approval for diversion of 1253 hectares of forest land for the project, mooted as the single biggest foreign direct investment in India.
“The environmental clearance for captive port is being accorded with 32 additional conditions over and above stipulated in the original environmental clearance of May 15, 2007,” the order signed by the Minister said.
Mr. Ramesh also asked Orissa government to give a categorical assurance that those claiming to be dependent on or cultivating the land in the Posco project area do not belong to the other traditional forest dwellers (OTFD) category under the Forest Rights Act, 2006.
This, according to him, would make it clear that there are no legally tenable claims of non-tribals wanting recognition as OTFDs under the FRA.
“Final approval of diversion of 1253 hectares of forest land for the Posco project would be granted as soon as this assurance of the State government is received by the MoEF,” the Minister said.
In August last year, Environment Ministry had directed the Orissa government to stop land acquisition for Korean steel giant Posco because it violates the Forest Rights Act.
The step was taken on the basis of a ground report submitted by a three-member committee set up by the Environment and Tribal Affairs Ministries.
The State government and Pohang Steel Company (POSCO), signed an MoU on June 22, 2005 for setting up an integrated steel plant of a total capacity of 12 million tonnes per annum at Paradeep in Jagatsinghpur district.
The plant would be located on the north-western bank of the Jatadharmohan river creek, 12 km south of the Paradeep Port requiring a total of 1620.496 hectares of land of which 1253.225 hectares is forest land and would affect eight villages in Erasama block of Kujang Tehsil.
The MoU also envisaged that the company would develop and operate a mining project in areas allocated by the government; a transportation project which includes a dedicated railway line, road and port; integrated township and water supply infrastructure.
But the project was delayed over green issues and protests by local residents who alleged that the setting up of plant would affect their largely agriculture and forest-based livelihoods.
The former Yugoslavia consisted of six republics and two autonomous regions. Today Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Slovenia, and Macedonia are independent nations. Serbia and Montenegro comprise the rump Yugoslavia.
Bosnia and Herzegovina make up a triangular-shaped republic, about half the size of Kentucky, on the Balkan Peninsula. The Bosnian region in the north is mountainous and covered with thick forests. The Herzegovina region in the south is largely rugged, flat farmland. It has a narrow coastline without natural harbors stretching 13 miles (20 km) along the Adriatic Sea. It is an emerging democracy, with a rotating, tripartite presidency divided between predominantly Serb, Croatian, and Bosnian political parties.
History
Called Illyricum in ancient times, the area now called Bosnia and Herzegovina was conquered by the Romans in the 2nd and 1st centuries B.C. and folded into the Roman province of Dalmatia. In the 4th and 5th centuries A.D, Goths overran that portion of the declining Roman Empire and occupied the area until the 6th century, when the Byzantine Empire claimed it. Slavs began settling the region during the 7th century. Around 1200, Bosnia won independence from Hungary and endured as an independent Christian state for some 260 years.
The expansion of the Ottoman Empire into the Balkans introduced another cultural, political, and religious framework. The Turks defeated the Serbs at the famous battle of Kosovo in 1389. They conquered Bosnia in 1463. During the 450 years in which Bosnia and Herzegovina were under Ottoman rule, many Christian Slavs became Muslim. Bosnian Islamic elite gradually developed and ruled the country on behalf of the Turkish overlords. As the borders of the Ottoman Empire began to shrink in the 19th century, Muslims from elsewhere in the Balkans migrated to Bosnia. Bosnia also developed a sizable Jewish population, with many Jews settling in Sarajevo after their expulsion from Spain in 1492. However, through the 19th century the term Bosnian commonly included residents of all faiths. A relatively secular society, intermarriage among religious groups was not uncommon.
Neighboring Serbia and Montenegro fought against the Ottoman Empire in 1876 and were aided by the Russians, their fellow Slavs. At the Congress of Berlin in 1878, following the end of the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878), Austria-Hungary was given a mandate to occupy and govern Bosnia and Herzegovina, in an effort by Europe to ensure that Russia did not dominate the Balkans. Although the provinces were still officially part of the Ottoman Empire, they were annexed by the Austro-Hungarian Empire on Oct. 7, 1908. As a result, relations with Serbia, which had claims on Bosnia and Herzegovina, became embittered. The hostility between the two countries climaxed in the assassination of Austrian archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914, by a Serbian nationalist. This event precipitated the start of World War I (1914–1918). Bosnia and Herzegovina were annexed to Serbia as part of the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes on Oct. 26, 1918. The name was later changed to Yugoslavia in 1929.
When Germany invaded Yugoslavia in 1941, Bosnia and Herzegovina were made part of Nazi-controlled Croatia. During the German and Italian occupation, Bosnian and Herzegovinian resistance fighters fought a fierce guerrilla war against the Ustachi, the Croatian Fascist troops. At the end of World War II, Bosnia and Herzegovina were reunited into a single state as one of the six republics of the newly reestablished Communist Yugoslavia under Marshall Tito. His authoritarian control kept the ethnic enmity of his patchwork nation in check. Tito died in 1980, and with growing economic dissatisfaction and the fall of the iron curtain over the next decade, Yugoslavia began to splinter.
In Dec. 1991, Bosnia and Herzegovina declared independence from Yugoslavia and asked for recognition by the European Union (EU). In a March 1992 referendum, Bosnian voters chose independence, and President Alija Izetbegovic declared the nation an independent state. Unlike the other former Yugoslav states, which were generally composed of a dominant ethnic group, Bosnia was an ethnic tangle of Muslims (44%), Serbs (31%), and Croats (17%), and this mix contributed to the duration and savagery of its fight for independence.
Ethnic Antgonism Erupts in War
Both the Croatian and Serbian presidents had planned to partition Bosnia between themselves. Attempting to carve out their own enclaves, the Serbian minority, with the help of the Serbian Yugoslav army, took the offensive and laid siege, particularly on Sarajevo, and began its ruthless campaigns of ethnic cleansing, which involved the expulsion or massacre of Muslims. Croats also began carving out their own communities. By the end of Aug. 1992, rebel Bosnian Serbs had conquered over 60% of Bosnia. The war did not begin to wane until NATO stepped in, bombing Serb positions in Bosnia in Aug. and Sept. 1995. Serbs entered the UN safe havens of Tuzla, Zepa, and Srebrenica, where they murdered thousands. About 250,000 died in the war between 1992 and 1995.
U.S.-sponsored peace talks in Dayton, Ohio, led to an agreement in 1995 that called for a Muslim-Croat federation and a Serb entity within the larger federation of Bosnia. Sixty thousand NATO troops were to supervise its implementation. Fighting abated and orderly elections were held in Sept. 1996. President Izetbegovic, a Bosnian Muslim, or Bosniak, won the majority of votes to become the leader of the three-member presidency, each representing one of the three ethnic groups.
But this alliance of unreconstructed enemies had little success in creating a working government or keeping violent clashes in check. The terms of the Dec. 1995 Dayton Peace Accord were largely ignored by Bosnian Serbs, with its former president, arch-nationalist Radovan Karadzic, still in de facto control of the Serbian enclave. Many indicted war criminals, including Karadzic, remain at large. NATO proved to be a largely ineffective peacekeeping force.
Post – Dayton Peace Accord
The crucial priorities facing postwar Bosnian leaders were rebuilding the economy, resettling the estimated one million refugees still displaced, and establishing a working government. Progress on these goals has been minimal, and a massive corruption scandal uncovered in 1999 severely tested the goodwill of the international community.
In 1994, the UN’s International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia opened in The Hague, Netherlands. In Aug. 2001, Radislav Drstic, a Bosnian Serb general, was found guilty of genocide in the killing of up to 8,000 Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica in 1995. It was the first genocide conviction in Europe since the UN genocide treaty was drawn up in 1951. In 2001, the trial of former Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic began. He was charged with crimes against humanity. The expensive and lengthy trial ended without a verdict when he died in March 2006.
Under pressure from Paddy Ashdown, the international administrator of Bosnia authorized under the Dayton Accord, Bosnian Serb leaders finally admitted in June 2004 that Serbian troops were responsible for the massacre of up to 8,000 Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica in 1995. Until then, Serb leaders had refused to acknowledge guilt in the worst civilian massacre since World War II. In Feb. 2007, the International Court of Justice ruled that the massacre was genocide, but stopped short of saying Serbia was directly responsible. The decision spared Serbia from having to pay war reparations to Bosnia. The court’s president, Judge Rosalyn Higgins, however, criticized Serbia for not preventing the genocide. The court also ordered Serbia to turn over Bosnian Serb leaders, including Ratko Mladic and Radovan Karakzic, who are accused of orchestrating the genocide and other crimes. Bosnians expressed disappointment with the ruling; they had demanded that Serbia pay war reparations.
In Dec. 2004, the European Union officially took over NATO’s peacekeeping mission in Bosnia. It is the largest peacekeeping operation the EU has undertaken. In March 2005, Ashdown, the international administrator, sacked Dragan Covic, the Croat member of the presidency, charging him with corruption and abuse of office. Covic became the third member of the Bosnian presidency forced to resign since the tripartite presidency was established.
Small Steps toward inclusion in the EU
Elections in Oct. 2006 reinforced the lingering ethnic tensions in the country. The Serbian coalition, which favors an independent state, narrowly defeated the Muslim-Croat Federation that prefers moving toward a more unified country. In January 2007, Bosnian Serb Nikola Spiric took over as prime minister and formed a new government. He resigned in Nov. 2007 to protest against reforms introduced by an international envoy, who was appointed under the Dayton Accords, by the UN and the European Union and has the power to enact legislation and dismiss ministers. Spiric said the reforms, which the EU said would help the country’s entrance into the organization, would diminish the influence of Bosnian Serbs and enhance those of other ethnic groups. Crisis was averted later in November, when Spiric and the country’s Croat and Muslim leaders agreed on a series of reforms approved by Parliament.
On July 21, 2008, Radovan Karadzic, the Bosnian Serb president during the war in Bosnia in the 1990s, was charged with genocide, persecution, deportation, and other crimes against non-Serb civilians. Karadzic orchestrated the massacre of almost 8,000 Muslim men and boys in 1995 in Srebrenica. He was found outside Belgrade. The arrest will likely bring Serbia closer to joining the European Union.
War Crimes in a chronological order
War crimes suspect Radovan Karadzic, who was arrested in Serbia on 21st July, 2008 started out as defender of the Serbs in the 1992-95 Bosnian war but ended up a fugitive wanted on genocide charges.
1992: Feb 29-March 1 - Bosnia’s Muslims and Croats vote for independence in referendum boycotted by Serbs.
April 6 - European Union recognises Bosnia’s independence. War breaks out and Serbs, under the leadership of Radovan Karadzic, lay siege to capital Sarajevo. They occupy 70 percent of the country, killing and persecuting Muslims and Croats to carve out a Serb Republic.
May - U.N. sanctions imposed on Serbia for backing rebel Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia.
1993: Jan. – Bosnia peace efforts fail, war breaks out between Muslims and Croats, previously allied against Serbs.
April - Srebrenica, Zepa and Gorazde in eastern Bosnia are declared three of six U.N. “safe areas”. The United Nations Protection Force UNPROFOR deploys troops and Bosnian Serb Army (VRS) attacks stop. But the town remains isolated and only a few humanitarian convoys reach it in the following two years. 1994:
March – U.S.-brokered agreement ends Muslim-Croat war and creates a Muslim-Croat federation.
1995: March - Bosnian Serb President Radovan Karadzic orders that Srebrenica and Zepa be entirely cut off and aid convoys be stopped from reaching the towns.
July 9 – Karadzic issues a new order to conquer Srebrenica.
July 11 – Bosnian Serbs troops, under the command of General Ratko Mladic, capture the eastern enclave and U.N. “safe area” of Srebrenica, killing about 8,000 Muslim males in the following week. The U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague indicts Karadzic and Mladic for genocide for the siege of Sarajevo.
August - NATO starts air strikes against Bosnian Serb troops.
Nov. 21 – Following NATO air strikes against Bosnian Serbs, Bosnian Muslim President Alija Izetbegovic, Croatian President Franjo Tudjman and Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic agree to a U.S.-brokered peace deal in Dayton, Ohio.
Dec. 14 – The three leaders sign the Dayton peace accords in Paris, paving the way for the arrival of a 66,000-strong NATO peacekeeping Implementation Force (IFOR) in Bosnia. The international community establishes a permanent presence in the country through the office of an international peace overseer.
1996: July – West forces Karadzic to quit as Bosnian Serb president.
September – Nationalist parties win first post-war election, confirming Bosnia’s ethnic division.
1997:
Having lost power, Karadzic goes underground.
2002: Feb. 12 - Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic goes on trial charged with 66 counts of genocide and war crimes in Bosnia, Croatia and Kosovo.
2003: Dec. - Ex-NATO commander tells the court Milosevic knew Bosnian Serbs planned to massacre Muslims in Bosnia in 1995 – 2004.
June 11 - In a belated abandonment of its endless denials and under strong international pressure, the Bosnian Serb government make a landmark admission — that Serbs indeed massacred thousands of Muslims at in Srebrenica, on Karadzic’s orders.
2006: March 11 – Milosevic is found dead in his cell in The Hague.
2008: July 21 - Bosnian Serb wartime president Radovan Karadzic, one of the world’s most wanted men for planning and ordering genocide, one of the world’s most wanted men, was arrested 13 years after he was first indicted by the United Nations War Crimes Tribunal.
The 63-year-old war crimes suspect faces genocide charges for his role in the massacre of more than 8,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica in Europe’s worst atrocity since the Second World War, and for organising the siege of Sarajevo which claimed 12,000 lives.
He is likely to be put on trial at The Hague in the most high-profile prosecution arising from the Balkans conflict since that of Slobodan Milosevic ended with the death from natural causes of the former Serb president in 2006 before a verdict could be reached.
Kosovo’s declaration of independence
Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia was enacted on Sunday, 17 February 2008 by a unanimous quorum of the Assembly of Kosovo, with 109 in favour and with no opposition, with all 11 representatives of the Serb minority boycotting the proceedings. International reaction was mixed, and the world community continues to be divided on the issue of the international recognition of Kosovo.
A number of states expressed concern over the unilateral character of Kosovo’s declaration, or announced explicitly that they will not recognise an independent Kosovo. The UN Security Council remains divided on this issue: of its five members with veto power, three (the United States, United Kingdom, France) have recognised the declaration of independence, while the People’s Republic of China has expressed concern, urging the continuation of the previous negotiation framework. Russia has rejected the declaration and considers it illegal. On 15 May 2008, Russia, China, and India released a joint statement where they called for new negotiations between the authorities of Belgrade and Pristina.
In Serbia, the ICJ’s judgment left the government’s policy towards Kosovo in ruins. Since 2008, the Serbian government has argued strongly that Kosovo’s independence was against international law, and called for new status-talks over the territory’s future; it also attached a lot of weight to the ICJ’s forthcoming decision. Yet as the verdict grew closer and perhaps in anticipation of a negative outcome, Serbia’s foreign minister Vuk Jeremić was emphatic that Belgrade would not recognise Kosovo’s independence irrespective of the outcome. The same view was reiterated by President Boris Tadić after the court published its opinion.
Current News
July 22, 2010
Kosovo’s unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia was legal under international law, declared the World Court in a groundbreaking ruling with implications for separatist movements around the world and for Belgrade’s stalled EU membership talks. The ruling – taken up by the international court of justice after a complaint from Serbia – is likely to lead more countries to recognise Kosovo’s independence. The tiny state is backed by 69 countries but needs 100 to join the UN. The court said the declaration was not in violation of UN resolution 1244, which Belgrade interprets as a guarantee of Serbia’s territorial integrity, as the resolution contained no provisions to prevent a unilateral declaration.
July 27 2010
Bosnia’s Serb entity vowed on Tuesday never to recognise Kosovo’s declaration of independence from Serbia although it was ruled legal by the World Court, and to back future Serbian moves on the matter The July 22 ruling rocked Serbia and analysts said it could both spur more states to recognise ethnic Albanian dominated Kosovo and embolden separatist minded regions everywhere including Bosnia’s Serb Republic, to more autonomy. The Prime Minister Milorad Dodik, told the reporters that it was best to follow Serbian policy. He feels that the Serb Republic must not take a position of recognising Kosovo regardless of the fact that major world powers believe the ICJ opinion resolves the Kosovo issue. He added that the Serb Republic, which along with the Muslim Croat Federation comprises post war Bosnia, would form a panel to analyse the ruling.
Serbia’s parliament on 25th July 2010, passed a resolution rejecting the ICJ ruling and mandating the government to lobby for new talks on the status of Kosovo by proposing a United Nations Security Council resolution.
The day after the ruling, Dodik revisited the idea of secession but the United States was quick to rule out any fresh partition of Bosnia, wrecked by inter ethnic fighting in 1992 95 and still under international supervision. Dodik, known for his separatist rhetoric, has called the meeting of all Bosnian Serb party leaders to discuss the effects of the world court ruling on Bosnia but most of them failed to show up, saying the meeting was arranged for Dodik’s promotion.
Borislav Bojic, of the biggest opposition Serb Democratic Party (SDS) said that Dodik had tried to exploit the situation around Kosovo for his own political promotion instead of securing consensus about such an important issue.
Bosnian Serbs continue to look for support to their wartime patron Serbia as well as Russia, which criticised the ruling and has not recognised Kosovo as an independent state.
They have made no secret of being unhappy in post war Bosnia and have threatened to call a referendum on secession, encouraged by nationalist politicians in Serbia angered by the Kosovo events.
Marko Pavic, head of the Democratic People’s Alliance (DNS) which is part of the ruling coalition led by Dodik’s Alliance of Independent Social Democrats party, said the ICJ opinion could well apply to the Serb Republic.
Continued bickering between Bosnian Muslims and Croats who want a stronger and functional central state, and Serbs who are keener on autonomy and closer ties with Serbia, has stalled Bosnia’s progress towards EU and NATO membership. October, 2010 elections are expected to worsen such tensions.
