| 09 December 2004 | Thursday | 26 Shawwal 1425 |
PPIB asking for a bit too much
Using a confiscated car
Harassing private schools
Islam and science
Engaging India
Lata and Asha
Bullet-proof cars
British senior citizens in Pakistan
Bad roads
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Addressing the South Asian Free Media Conference in Lahore on Nov 20, Gen Pervez Musharraf described India-Pakistan relations with the help of an adage of the 'elephants trampling the grass under their feet' when fighting or making love.
After the conference, the Indian journalists covering the event portrayed the Indian view by saying that the elephants in Gen Musharraf's mind were actually "pachyderms of unequal sizes and strength". On the question of parity, they said India only "humoured" the notion of parity with Pakistan and "pretended" that it accepted it.
This Indian perception is disturbing since it reflects its mindset and an air of superiority in its dealings with its neighbours. India, therefore, may be trying to humour Pakistan into complacence to achieve its own vicious ends.
This Indian view explains the reasons for its apathy to the Kashmir issue. It has now come up with a new nine-point strategy in answer to Gen Musharraf's seven-region formula. It has rejected his proposal on the plea that redrawing borders is not acceptable to India at this stage.
The new Indian package envisages maximum autonomy for Kashmir within the Indian constitution, softening of the LoC, the allocation of massive funds for its development and the recruitment of Kashmiri youth from the border belt, ostensibly to pitch them against their brethren across the LoC.
India is willing to talk to both factions of the Hurriyat Conference, but is not willing to include Pakistan in these talks. Also, it is not prepared to concede the right of self-determination to the people of Kashmir.
As for the composite dialogue, our fondness seems to be a one-way affair only. India is pushing its own agenda but dragging its feet on Kashmir. Gen Musharraf had seen some light at the end of the New York tunnel on Sept 24, but that appears to have been abruptly turned off by Mr Manmohan Singh.
India's strategy for Pakistan has two discernible dimensions: military and economic. In the military dimension, it is frantically building up its arsenal and acquiring military hardware worth $7.5 billion.
Simultaneously, it is crying hoarse against Pakistan for its attempts to acquire spares for its military machines, to say nothing of removing imbalances. It wants to involve Pakistan in an arms race that Pakistan can ill afford. Pakistan has more pressing development requirements and a small economy to support both defence and development.
In the economic dimension, India is planning to stifle Pakistan's agriculture-based economy by building a series of dams on rivers Chenab, Jehlum, Neelam and Kabul (in Afghanistan). When these dams are complete, India will possess the capability to choke the flow of water into Pakistan if it wants.
India is also frantically trying to get Pakistan's markets opened for its products. This will enable it to achieve better economies of scale and flood our markets with its cheap products. That will be detrimental to our own indigenous industry.
These ominous developments need dispassionate evaluation and appropriate strategies to counter their adverse effects. Militarily, we must not lower our guard and maintain credible deterrence.
In the economic field, we must save our agro-economy and move the World Bank and the International Court of Justice to stop further construction of dams and also to get our due share of water.
We should also ask Mr Hamid Karzai to stop India from constructing a dam on the River Kabul. The Arbitration Clause of the Indus Basin Treaty may also be invoked, if required.
India's emphasis on improved economic ties and an expansion of people-to-people contact should be linked to progress on the Kashmir talks. We must not be 'humoured away' from the core issue.
India must understand that there are only seven nuclear powers in the world, and Pakistan is one of them. The status of all nuclear powers is equal. Pachyderms may, therefore, appear to India of unequal sizes, but actually they are of equal strength.
LT-GEN (RETD) S.M.H.BOKHARI
Rawalpindi
PPIB asking for a bit too much
It was a bad for move for the Private Power & Infrastructure Board (PPIB) to attempt to circumvent Nepra's recent ruling on an upward revision of power rates by asking the prime minister to unilaterally permit the increase. The PM acted wisely by refusing to accede.
Nevertheless, the development may influence Nepra into re-examining its stand, which could be worse. PPIB's request was termed a 'charge sheet' against Nepra's 2002 tariff policy that allows entering into purchase agreements valid only up to 2009.
According to reports, the PPIB termed Nepra's policy a stumbling block to promoting private investment in the power sector, because of which, allegedly, 60 prospective investors with proposals worth $13 billion decided not to invest. They wanted tariff and power firm purchase agreements valid for up to 35 years.
Nepra's policy may lack rationality, but the demand for tariffs valid for as long as 35 years certainly isn't rational, given the enormous volatility in every market, especially financial and oil markets, and the performance of many private power producers (remember Enron and several other US producers that failed?). Many among those demanding 35-year contracts can't guarantee their own existence and delivery capability for even a decade.
It would be unfair to demand a firm tariff and purchase contract for periods exceeding seven years, which is the usual payoff period of a power project based on fossil fuel. Nepra's policy was based on this very rationale.
If, however, producers want longer contracts, the contracts must provide for floating tariffs with caps and collars and to be pegged to the price of the fuel used by the producer as well as to a volume-weighted index of the prices other producers in the region are charging.
A 35-year contract is unworkable for both the producer and the buyer because it binds them irrespective of the whole variety of changes in their circumstance that may take place over such a long period.
Markets are volatile and hedging instruments are unable to cover emerging risks; this should have taught all market players bitter lessons, especially power producers who use fossil fuels. Apparently, that wasn't the case with many who walked away from Pakistan.
A.B. SHAHID
Karachi
Using a confiscated car
I was driving on Mai Kolachi last week when a red land cruiser came up right next to my car and I was asked to pull over. For a moment I thought that either I was being kidnapped or my car was about to be snatched.
But before I could have reacted, a traffic cop, on a motorcycle, halted his vehicle and two cops came rushing from the Jackson Traffic Section. A high-ranking police officer, a police DIG, as I was to learn later, ordered that I be issued a challan and that my car be confiscated.
My crime was that my car had tinted windows. The policemen tore off the plastic film on the windows, which I didn't object to, but I told them that they had no legal authority to confiscate my car. They responded by forcibly taking away my car keys. By that time the DIG had left.
The cops told me that only the DIG had the authority to release my car and that, after paying the penalty, I ought to approach him, which was not as simple as it seemed. I went to the bank, paid the penalty and obtained a receipt. I then went to the police head office where I was made to wait for what seemed like eternity.
When all my attempts to contact the DIG failed, I returned to the traffic kiosk where my car was 'under arrest'. I was told that, unless the DIG gave the clearance, my car would remain there for days. What they didn't tell me was that my car would be used by them in the meantime.
I should have contacted my uncle, a senior journalist, but I didn't want to bother him, so through a well-connected friend who got in touch with someone who knows the DIG personally, I presented my case.
I was told the DIG had been requested to issue instructions to release my car, which he said he would. Despite this I had to wait for an hour before I could get my car back.
While I do accept that cars shouldn't have tinted windows, I wonder why owners or even the drivers of large cars and land cruisers are not punished. Only lesser mortals like me are bullied.
A VICTIM
Karachi
Harassing private schools
Hayatabad Town in Peshawar was established about 18 years ago. In the beginning there were no government schools in the area, so some private schools started functioning in residential houses, which the Peshawar Development Authority had no objection to in the beginning.
Later on, government schools were established in residential areas. In 1989 some plots were earmarked for school buildings, but people who had been running private schools stood no chance in the allotment.
Then the Peshawar Development Authority, now known as the City Development and Municipal Department, also started harassing these private schools to close down. This harassment is still going on, resulting in a state of continued uncertainty for students, parents and school management.
On the other hand, the provincial education department has no objections to these private schools running. This is evident since it is liberally renewing their annual registrations.
Moreover, the Capital Development Authority in Islamabad recently decided that it would lift the ban on private schools in residential areas, given that it is now the policy of the federal government to increase the literacy rate.
The private schools in Hayatabad Town should similarly be allowed to continue running in the existing residential premises without being harassed, or else they should be allotted plots for the construction of school buildings.
W.B. CHAUDHRI
Peshawar
Islam and science
This is with reference to the letters "Islam and science" (Dec 2 and 4) by Prof Mukhtar Ali Naqvi and Mr Khurram Haneef. The desire to link scientific progress by Muslims to Islam seems to be part of a larger desire to establish the concept of a "Muslim world" - something that has been noticeable in a number of articles I have read over the past few months in this newspaper.
There is, unfortunately, abundant evidence that, even within single-nation states, peoples of a single faith and culture find it difficult to nurture and maintain stable relationships. Across multiple-nation states there is the additional problem of often significant differences in culture as well.
While it is admirable to search for common ground with other nations and stress our similarities in faith and culture, I cannot help thinking that at this point we do not yet have enough empirical evidence to argue for the existence of a unified "Muslim world".
A.S. MA,
USA
Engaging India
The recently-published book Engaging India by Mr Strobe Talbott, a top state department official of the Clinton era, is an incisive and informative account of the sustained Indo-American negotiations on the altered security structure in the wake of nuclear tests by India and Pakistan and the prospect of significant upgrading of Indo-American relations.
While the book as a whole merits a separate review, this comment has been occasioned by India's former foreign minister Mr Jaswant Singh's virulent attacks and observations on Pakistan and Islamic ethos in general. He was Mr Talbott's opposition in the long-running negotiations from 1998 to 2000.
Viewed in the context of the current peace process and the importance of building trust, Mr Singh's statements make very sad reading. During the period under review, he served as foreign minister or acted in this capacity while the portfolio was initially with prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.
While criticism of one's adversary is a common routine in discussions with third parties where contentious issues are involved, the intolerant view of the nature of the Pakistan state and Islamic influences generally expressed by an Indian of Mr Singh's sophistication and perceived intellectual level reinforces disturbing doubts and serious misgivings about the Indian mindset.
I hope the current peace efforts would help mellow such a mindset, where it exists, and lend it greater tolerance and flexibility. In the book, some of the quotes attributed to Mr Singh would be instructive for our readers:
"He (Jaswant Singh) described Pakistan as the 'avtar' of all that was intolerant, aggressive and terrorist about radical Islam. India by contest was an 'avtar' of all that was benign and tolerant. This was said over an excellent meal, while viewing the splendours of Rome" (page 134).
On another occasion, Mr Talbott quotes Mr Singh as saying: "From the moment of its birth, Pakistan has gone terribly and permanently wrong" (page 84). Elsewhere the writer says: "Bruce Reid told Shamshad Ahmed (foreign secretary) that Clinton would like nothing better than to show up in person (in Pakistan) and refute Samuel Huntington and his Hindu equivalents.
He was referring to the line of argument we had heard from Jaswant Singh and others that Pakistan represented a civilization (Islamic?) gone bad with which both India and the West were bound to clash" (page 124).
"Jaswant's theory posited the need for the Judeo-Christian West, secular India and moderate Muslim states to make common cause against a single source of global evil, rooted in radical regimes like Pakistan's and radical groups like Al Qaeda (page 119).
"I found troublesome the way Islam fitted into Jaswant's world view. By implication while Parsis and Christians qualified as welcome addition to India's melting pot, Muslim did not... Islam was all about conquest and conversion by the sword...with its proclivities for male chauvinism and misogyny."
In Mr Talbott's view: "This was an invidious oversimplification of Islam, an all too common feature of one side in the world-wide debate about the religious and cultural roots of terrorism" (page 134).
Now an excerpt from a history lesson by Mr Singh: "Pakistan had never been a cohesive nation or viable state and never would be. It was an artificial construct, structured out of hate; a stepchild of 'Uttar Pradesh', the Indian state where the pre-partition Muslim League had its roots" (page 118).
Elsewhere Mr Talbott remarks that "Pakistan was still on the map and for many Indians its very existence rankled" (page 7). There are other similar statements, not being reproduced here.
Engaging India has been written, incidentally, by an admirer of India and a professed admirer of Mr Singh himself. Teased by his colleagues about his partiality for the Indian foreign minister, Mr Talbott maintained that since he had to engage with India in the line of duty, it was good that he was doing it through an engaging Indian.
MAHDI MASUD
Karachi
Lata and Asha
Mr Daraius Kakalia's (Dec 2) objection to my letter (Nov 5) is totally out of context. I had only pointed out some of Lata Mangeshkar's songs which musicologist Saeed Malik had inadvertently missed in his otherwise balanced piece on the great singer.
Mr Kakalia seems to have objected to me using the adjective "unmatched" for Lataji. May I remind him that I had made no mention of how many songs she had sung, which is of no importance to me. What matters is how many memorable songs she recorded. In that I would insist that Lataji would be unmatched in India.
I am aware of Mr Kakalia's admiration for Asha Bhosle and I must say that I too hold her in high esteem. If I were asked to name the three most outstanding singers in the subcontinent, I would unhesitatingly mention Melody Queen Noor Jehan, Lataji and Ashaji. They are all great in their own right. I would like to quote a Faiz couplet for Mr Kakalia's benefit:
Woh baat saare fasaney mein jiska zikr na tha,
Woh baat unko buhat nagawar guzri hai.
SULTAN ARSHAD
Karachi
Bullet-proof cars
According to a press report, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz has directed the Cabinet Division to import 10 Mercedes Benz S600L bullet-proof cars to be used by VVIPs. He justified this by saying these cars would protect high-profile government officials.
Muslims believe that every man's time of death is written in the book of destiny. How then, can a bullet-proof car save someone from death? Every ruler has made it a tradition to spend public money for their protection and comfort.
In civilised society the life of an ordinary citizen is considered as important as the life of a president or prime minister. Why then is the standard of living of Muslim rulers so extravagant compared to that of their fellow citizens especially when Islam teaches equality of mankind?
How can our rulers spend millions of the public's money on self-protection and still call themselves true Muslims when 35 per cent of their people live below the poverty line?
ENGR. S. T. HUSSAIN
Lahore
British senior citizens in Pakistan
More than 10,000 British citizens of Pakistani origin live in Pakistan. Men who are 65 years and women who are 60 years old are defined as senior citizens of the United Kingdom and are therefore entitled to state pensions.
Their pensions are not increased annually. The European Community does this for its senior resident citizens and other countries with a UK reciprocal arrangement do it too.
British senior citizens living in Pakistan also lose out on an annual tax-free 200-pound Christmas gift from the Queen, also known as a fuel allowance. I urge the Pakistan government to sign a reciprocal agreement with the UK government, similar to the one on double taxation. This will help more foreign exchange flow into Pakistan and give British senior citizens more funds to spend in this country.
MUZAFFAR ALI
Lahore
Bad roads
We are a developing country but unfortunately almost every government department is riddled with corruption or mismanagement. As a result, people continue to suffer. A glaring example of this is our road infrastructure.
All year round, road construction and repairs continue but, within months of their completion, the roads fall into disrepair again. This is because substandard material is used, eventually damaging the vehicles that use these roads.
It is time the authorities concerned assigned road infrastructure top priority so that the country continued to make progress.
SANA KANWAL
Jamshoro
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